04-20-2024, 07:34 AM
(This post was last modified: 04-20-2024, 08:15 AM by DL14. Edited 1 time in total.)
When we last left off, the Water Crystal shattered into pieces, a giant elephant-like creature was slain, and an unknown man from a meteor apologized to Triceracop, further puzzling his amnesia-laden mind. There’s not much time to ponder though as the entire tower begins to shake. The small peninsula of the island appears to be sinking! The crew grab the closest shard they can and book it out of the tower, making it out before it is too late. They inspect the shard they took and realize they now have the power of the Summoner, allowing them to summon allies into battle. Currently they can summon Fig Newton (who delivers a powerful, chocobo-like kick to an enemy), Leroy Jenkins (who drains health from an enemy and uses it to heal all allies), and Matt Wilkins (who casts strong ice magic on all enemies). Seer Ial, Walter Yensid, and Triceracop all switch over to this Summoner class, while Bugs remains in their Thief garments. When asked why they didn’t switch, Bugs responds, “Don’t you know the tradition of Fiesta?! We always must have at least one of each class!” Seer stares at them in disbelief, but doesn’t fight it. “Let’s just move on. Where is the Fire Crystal and how do we get there?” Walter answers, “The Fire Crystal is in Portland, but how we get there… well that’s a bit of a puzzle now.” They begin to think for a moment before Triceracop jumps in. “Look, I know the Fire Crystal is important, but can we check out that meteor? The man that supposedly came from it knew me. I have to investigate it for clues about my past.” Without any other clear direction, the group agrees and heads to the meteor.
At the meteor, the group immediately notices an opening in the front, almost like a doorway of sorts. They make their way inside and find that it is quite spacious. There is a strange glow coming from an opening in the center. Triceracop approaches it to take a closer look, but as he gets near it, a white light flashes and suddenly he’s gone! Vanished into thin air! Bugs and Walter freak out and run towards the center, instantly vanishing as well. Seer sighs. “Guess I better follow.” He cautiously approaches and he too vanishes into the light…
The light fades around Seer, and as he looks around, he sees that he’s still inside the meteor along with the rest of the group. The meteor looks a little different though, and everyone agrees they should exit and see what’s going on. To their surprise, they come out in an entirely new location, as if they had warped somewhere. Walter’s eyes light up. “Hey, we’re near Portland! What luck! We just gotta get around this mountain range.” The group doesn’t question the deus ex machina that got them here and quickly make their way to Portland, with Bugs ensuring that the group can avoid as many of the wolves and tortoises that try to attack them. Upon arrival, Tricercop suggests that they check the local shops to see if they can get any equipment for their newfound class. Inside the weapon shop, they notice that there is a large assortment of elemental rods available for the cheap. The shopkeep mentions that because of the power of the Fire Crystal, the economy has been thriving heavily, allowing them to keep prices low for the good of the people. Seer smiles as they purchase a full set of elemental rods for everyone. As they leave the store however, they are quickly approached by a set of guards, led by Upceti Spaghetti. Upceti seems furious. “It’s them officers! Arrest them! I saw them crawl out of that meteor with my own eyes! They’re in cahoots with that dastardly werewolf!!” The group is confused. “What are you even talking about? What werewolf?” asks Bugs. “Silence villains! Take them away!” The guards quickly apprehend them and take them to the castle’s dungeon…
“Well this is a fine mess we’ve gotten into. How are we supposed to get out of here?” Walter paces furiously, unsure how to resolve this issue. Suddenly there’s a big explosion and the left side of their jail cell blasts open, revealing an older man. “Ah fiddledumps! That was my last explosive and it’s just another cell! I’m such a failure.” The others chuckle at this. “Y’all think this is funny?!” The others quickly regain their composure. The man shakes his head. “I guess it would be a bit humorous. Anyway, I’m Leonardo Da Pinchi.” Walter’s eyes light up. “You’re the one that created the devices that are destroying the crystals!” Leonardo lowers his head. “Um… sorry that was rude of me,” Walter stammers. “Well, you aren’t wrong,” Leonardo responds. “But once I heard the Wind Crystal had shattered, I tried to shut down the device that draws power from the Fire Crystal. Of course, the guards caught me and threw me in here. Like I don’t know what my machines are capable of. Wait, what are you all in here for? You know about the crystals?” Walter nods. “We’re trying to save the remaining crystals. The Water Crystal has shattered as well.” The shards of crystals start to glow. Leonardo is taken aback. “Those are crystal shards?! Have they chosen you to protect them?” Seer nods.
At this time, the dungeon doors open. Jonathan Irons enters the room. “Leonardo! We have a problem!” He rushes forward and unlocks the door to everyone’s cell. “Leonardo, the Fire Crystal has cracked!” “Cracked you say? Well shut off the power to it!” Jordan lowers his head. “We did sir, but it seems like the power of the crystal is still being drained. What’s even worse, King Tyler Higbee II is nowhere to be found! Oh this is such a disaster!” Leonardo thinks for a minute. “The fire-powered ship…” “The what now?” “The fire-powered ship must still be draining power from the crystal. We must send someone into its engine room to shut it down. In fact, I volunteer these strapping people here!” Leonardo motions towards Bugs and company. “Them?!” shouts Jonathan. “But, they’re in cahoots with the werewolf! We saw them come from the meteor!” Leonardo steps away. “Look, I’m a feeble old man. I can’t make it into that engine room myself. These youngsters are more than willing to help! And if you don’t let them go then I won’t help either.” Jonathan looks uncomfortable, but eventually relents. “Alright, they’re free to go. But please, hurry!” Jonathan leaves the room. Leonardo turns to the others. “You will help us right? I did just save your bacon there.” Seer nods. “We have the same goal here. Where is this ship anyway?” “It’s on the docks just south of the castle, you can’t miss it! You all ready yourselves, I’ll go on ahead and prepare for the excursion.” They group nods as Leonardo takes his leave. “Just what is a ‘fire-powered ship’ anyway?” ponders Bugs. “Can it sail better than my pirate ship?” “Guess we’ll just have to find out ourselves,” states Triceracop. With that, the crew heads towards the docks.
As they reach the docks, they are greeted by Leonardo. “What took you so long?! C’mon now, get in there and save our crystal! Also, beware of the machinery inside. Some of our security bots seem to have gone rogue and will attack whatever they see.” Bugs nods, knowing they’ll be able to out maneuver anything that tries to approach them. Indeed, Bugs is easily able to outrun all the enemies inside, making it quite the easy journey. Of course, being protagonists of this quest, they all take the time to thoroughly explore the place, looting everything that isn’t tied down (and even then, they tried). Bugs is grateful they did, as they got some really nice Thief equipment, including a weapon that works from long range in the Moonring Blade, a Green Beret that boosts agility and strength, and a Thief’s Glove that makes it much easier to steal things. Eventually, the group reaches the elevator and makes their way to the engine room. Inside though, they find something completely unexpected…
“Tyler Higbee? Why are you down here?” asks Walter. Tyler lowers his head, then slowly turns towards the group. A strange aura radiates from him, as if he were possessed. “You annoying twerps! I shall punish you for interfering with my resurrection!” Tyler raises his arms and the room starts to shake. Behind him, the engine begins to burst out some flames. The flames swirl together and then charge towards the group, taking the form of a humanoid. Walter is quick to act, summoning Matt Wilkins to chill out the flames with the power of ice. The living flame retaliates by sending a wall of fire into the group before shapeshifting into a tornado. Seer is ready and summons Matt Wilkins again, doing another round of massive damage with ice power. The fiery tornado pulls Triceracop towards it slightly before changing again, this time into the shape of a hand. Triceracop is ready, summoning Matt Wilkins himself to bring the freeze once again, but strangely, this hand form seems to be immune to it. The fire hand doesn’t appreciate this and smacks Triceracop, temporarily paralyzing him. Not one to watch his ally go numb, Bugs throws his Moonring Blade at the hand, doing a decent amount of damage. The hand unleashes a massive fireball directly at Seer, knocking him unconscious. It then transforms back into its humanoid form and unleashes another wall of fire at the group. Everyone is starting to wear down now, but Walter calls upon Matt Wilkins once again. This time the power of ice finally finishes the job, and the fiery creature is extinguished. As the group begins to tend to their wounds, they notice that Tyler Higbee is also on the ground. With the dark aura around him seemingly gone, they make for his aid. Tyler speaks slowly. “I… I was being controlled by some dark power. They kept saying… saying they would resurrect themselves. The crystals… they were using the power of the crystals for their own goal. They wish to inflict the world in darkness. The fire crystal… it’s just ahead. Save it… I’ll be ok…” The party nods and continues on through.
In the next room, the party finds the crystal still intact. As they enter, a werewolf comes in from the back side of the room. “Oh good, the crystal is still ok.” As it approaches it notices the group and seems a bit surprised. “Triceracop?! Is that you?!” As it approaches, Walter stands guard. “Stay away from the crystal you beast!” “Relax, I’m not your enemy!” “How do we know that?!” Triceracop seems puzzled. The werewolf speaks to him. “Triceracop, are you ok?” Triceracop lowers his head. “You know who I am?” He holds his head. “This migraine is killing me. I still can’t remember a thing…” While this is going on, a random Portland soldier sneaks in the back of the room. She makes her way to a switch on the wall and flips it, sending a surge of energy towards the crystal. “What are you doing?” shouts the werewolf. “You’re going to blow up the crystal!” A familiar dark aura appears around the soldier. “That is indeed the plan! Just one more to go before the seal is broken! Mwhaha!” The soldier vanishes into thin air as the room begins to shake. The group rushes for the switch to turn it off, but it’s no use as the lever is busted. The room shakes harder and fires begin to break out all over the place. “Get out of here!” shouts the werewolf. “I’ll try to slow this down as much as I can, you need to save the last crystal! This place is gonna explode, get to safety!” “Explode?” asks Seer. Bugs nods. “This whole empire thrived off the power of the crystal, and the fire it provided was the source of all the machinery in the castle. Once it goes…” Walter pipes in. “The castle will explode?!” Bugs nods. “We gotta go!”
Will our heroes make it out in time? Find out next time, and vote on our next set of jobs in the meanwhile!
Beastmaster: A physical support class that specializes in using whips. They have the ability to catch monsters in battle, then releasing them later to use against another enemy. Sadly you can only hold one monster at a time, and they’re gone once you release them. Still there is quite the wide variety of options available if you know what you’re looking for, and you can pull off quite a bit of cool niche stuff in the right situations. Whether that’s worth the effort or not is to be determined.
Geomancer: A magical class that uses the power of the Earth against their opponents. Their powers are based upon the nearby terrain (i.e. you’ll get sand based attacks in the desert, tree based attacks in the forest, rock slides inside caves and mountains, etc.) Some of these are decently strong while others leave a lot to be desired. The randomness of their power, combined with the fact that often enemies are resistant to their local habitats puts a damper on what a Geomancer can do, but they can be useful in the right situations.
Ninja: A premier physical class, Ninjas are very adept at wielding two weapons at once. They are extremely fast and can pack a punch. They also have the ability to throw weapons and items at an enemy, dealing damage proportional to the strength of the weapon. There are special ninja stars that can do a ton of damage to a single target, and there are also elemental scrolls that can deal magical damage to a whole group of enemies. While these scrolls don’t do the most damage with the Ninja’s base magic powered, paired with a magical class (like the Summoner we already have), they can really pack a punch!
Bard: A pure support class, the Bard has the power of song. Early on these songs grant status effects such as regen on allies and sleep or confusion on enemies. Later on, they get songs that will buff their allies stats, granting them increased power and speed. They will also learn a requiem that does massive damage against undead creatures. Finally they have the power to hide, dodging any and all attacks from the enemies (albeit not being able to contribute to the fight themselves while hiding). While the Bard sounds weak (and is quite frail), the stat buffing songs can really go crazy later on, buffing the party up to crazy levels of power.
Ranger: A physical class, Rangers specialize in using bows and arrows. This allows them to attack from distance, a nice boost to their defenses given their inability to wear heavy armor. They start with the ability to Aim, which gives them perfect accuracy on an attack at the cost of a small amount of preparation time. They also have the ability to call random woodland creatures to the battle, providing some strange, usually beneficial effects with them. Their ultimate ability though may be the best physical ability in the game: Rapid Fire. With Rapid Fire, the Ranger will randomly attack any enemy four times, dealing half damage with each attack but ignoring defense in the process. While sometimes the random targeting of it may be an issue, its pure damage output is more often than not well worth it.
At the meteor, the group immediately notices an opening in the front, almost like a doorway of sorts. They make their way inside and find that it is quite spacious. There is a strange glow coming from an opening in the center. Triceracop approaches it to take a closer look, but as he gets near it, a white light flashes and suddenly he’s gone! Vanished into thin air! Bugs and Walter freak out and run towards the center, instantly vanishing as well. Seer sighs. “Guess I better follow.” He cautiously approaches and he too vanishes into the light…
The light fades around Seer, and as he looks around, he sees that he’s still inside the meteor along with the rest of the group. The meteor looks a little different though, and everyone agrees they should exit and see what’s going on. To their surprise, they come out in an entirely new location, as if they had warped somewhere. Walter’s eyes light up. “Hey, we’re near Portland! What luck! We just gotta get around this mountain range.” The group doesn’t question the deus ex machina that got them here and quickly make their way to Portland, with Bugs ensuring that the group can avoid as many of the wolves and tortoises that try to attack them. Upon arrival, Tricercop suggests that they check the local shops to see if they can get any equipment for their newfound class. Inside the weapon shop, they notice that there is a large assortment of elemental rods available for the cheap. The shopkeep mentions that because of the power of the Fire Crystal, the economy has been thriving heavily, allowing them to keep prices low for the good of the people. Seer smiles as they purchase a full set of elemental rods for everyone. As they leave the store however, they are quickly approached by a set of guards, led by Upceti Spaghetti. Upceti seems furious. “It’s them officers! Arrest them! I saw them crawl out of that meteor with my own eyes! They’re in cahoots with that dastardly werewolf!!” The group is confused. “What are you even talking about? What werewolf?” asks Bugs. “Silence villains! Take them away!” The guards quickly apprehend them and take them to the castle’s dungeon…
“Well this is a fine mess we’ve gotten into. How are we supposed to get out of here?” Walter paces furiously, unsure how to resolve this issue. Suddenly there’s a big explosion and the left side of their jail cell blasts open, revealing an older man. “Ah fiddledumps! That was my last explosive and it’s just another cell! I’m such a failure.” The others chuckle at this. “Y’all think this is funny?!” The others quickly regain their composure. The man shakes his head. “I guess it would be a bit humorous. Anyway, I’m Leonardo Da Pinchi.” Walter’s eyes light up. “You’re the one that created the devices that are destroying the crystals!” Leonardo lowers his head. “Um… sorry that was rude of me,” Walter stammers. “Well, you aren’t wrong,” Leonardo responds. “But once I heard the Wind Crystal had shattered, I tried to shut down the device that draws power from the Fire Crystal. Of course, the guards caught me and threw me in here. Like I don’t know what my machines are capable of. Wait, what are you all in here for? You know about the crystals?” Walter nods. “We’re trying to save the remaining crystals. The Water Crystal has shattered as well.” The shards of crystals start to glow. Leonardo is taken aback. “Those are crystal shards?! Have they chosen you to protect them?” Seer nods.
At this time, the dungeon doors open. Jonathan Irons enters the room. “Leonardo! We have a problem!” He rushes forward and unlocks the door to everyone’s cell. “Leonardo, the Fire Crystal has cracked!” “Cracked you say? Well shut off the power to it!” Jordan lowers his head. “We did sir, but it seems like the power of the crystal is still being drained. What’s even worse, King Tyler Higbee II is nowhere to be found! Oh this is such a disaster!” Leonardo thinks for a minute. “The fire-powered ship…” “The what now?” “The fire-powered ship must still be draining power from the crystal. We must send someone into its engine room to shut it down. In fact, I volunteer these strapping people here!” Leonardo motions towards Bugs and company. “Them?!” shouts Jonathan. “But, they’re in cahoots with the werewolf! We saw them come from the meteor!” Leonardo steps away. “Look, I’m a feeble old man. I can’t make it into that engine room myself. These youngsters are more than willing to help! And if you don’t let them go then I won’t help either.” Jonathan looks uncomfortable, but eventually relents. “Alright, they’re free to go. But please, hurry!” Jonathan leaves the room. Leonardo turns to the others. “You will help us right? I did just save your bacon there.” Seer nods. “We have the same goal here. Where is this ship anyway?” “It’s on the docks just south of the castle, you can’t miss it! You all ready yourselves, I’ll go on ahead and prepare for the excursion.” They group nods as Leonardo takes his leave. “Just what is a ‘fire-powered ship’ anyway?” ponders Bugs. “Can it sail better than my pirate ship?” “Guess we’ll just have to find out ourselves,” states Triceracop. With that, the crew heads towards the docks.
As they reach the docks, they are greeted by Leonardo. “What took you so long?! C’mon now, get in there and save our crystal! Also, beware of the machinery inside. Some of our security bots seem to have gone rogue and will attack whatever they see.” Bugs nods, knowing they’ll be able to out maneuver anything that tries to approach them. Indeed, Bugs is easily able to outrun all the enemies inside, making it quite the easy journey. Of course, being protagonists of this quest, they all take the time to thoroughly explore the place, looting everything that isn’t tied down (and even then, they tried). Bugs is grateful they did, as they got some really nice Thief equipment, including a weapon that works from long range in the Moonring Blade, a Green Beret that boosts agility and strength, and a Thief’s Glove that makes it much easier to steal things. Eventually, the group reaches the elevator and makes their way to the engine room. Inside though, they find something completely unexpected…
“Tyler Higbee? Why are you down here?” asks Walter. Tyler lowers his head, then slowly turns towards the group. A strange aura radiates from him, as if he were possessed. “You annoying twerps! I shall punish you for interfering with my resurrection!” Tyler raises his arms and the room starts to shake. Behind him, the engine begins to burst out some flames. The flames swirl together and then charge towards the group, taking the form of a humanoid. Walter is quick to act, summoning Matt Wilkins to chill out the flames with the power of ice. The living flame retaliates by sending a wall of fire into the group before shapeshifting into a tornado. Seer is ready and summons Matt Wilkins again, doing another round of massive damage with ice power. The fiery tornado pulls Triceracop towards it slightly before changing again, this time into the shape of a hand. Triceracop is ready, summoning Matt Wilkins himself to bring the freeze once again, but strangely, this hand form seems to be immune to it. The fire hand doesn’t appreciate this and smacks Triceracop, temporarily paralyzing him. Not one to watch his ally go numb, Bugs throws his Moonring Blade at the hand, doing a decent amount of damage. The hand unleashes a massive fireball directly at Seer, knocking him unconscious. It then transforms back into its humanoid form and unleashes another wall of fire at the group. Everyone is starting to wear down now, but Walter calls upon Matt Wilkins once again. This time the power of ice finally finishes the job, and the fiery creature is extinguished. As the group begins to tend to their wounds, they notice that Tyler Higbee is also on the ground. With the dark aura around him seemingly gone, they make for his aid. Tyler speaks slowly. “I… I was being controlled by some dark power. They kept saying… saying they would resurrect themselves. The crystals… they were using the power of the crystals for their own goal. They wish to inflict the world in darkness. The fire crystal… it’s just ahead. Save it… I’ll be ok…” The party nods and continues on through.
In the next room, the party finds the crystal still intact. As they enter, a werewolf comes in from the back side of the room. “Oh good, the crystal is still ok.” As it approaches it notices the group and seems a bit surprised. “Triceracop?! Is that you?!” As it approaches, Walter stands guard. “Stay away from the crystal you beast!” “Relax, I’m not your enemy!” “How do we know that?!” Triceracop seems puzzled. The werewolf speaks to him. “Triceracop, are you ok?” Triceracop lowers his head. “You know who I am?” He holds his head. “This migraine is killing me. I still can’t remember a thing…” While this is going on, a random Portland soldier sneaks in the back of the room. She makes her way to a switch on the wall and flips it, sending a surge of energy towards the crystal. “What are you doing?” shouts the werewolf. “You’re going to blow up the crystal!” A familiar dark aura appears around the soldier. “That is indeed the plan! Just one more to go before the seal is broken! Mwhaha!” The soldier vanishes into thin air as the room begins to shake. The group rushes for the switch to turn it off, but it’s no use as the lever is busted. The room shakes harder and fires begin to break out all over the place. “Get out of here!” shouts the werewolf. “I’ll try to slow this down as much as I can, you need to save the last crystal! This place is gonna explode, get to safety!” “Explode?” asks Seer. Bugs nods. “This whole empire thrived off the power of the crystal, and the fire it provided was the source of all the machinery in the castle. Once it goes…” Walter pipes in. “The castle will explode?!” Bugs nods. “We gotta go!”
Will our heroes make it out in time? Find out next time, and vote on our next set of jobs in the meanwhile!
Beastmaster: A physical support class that specializes in using whips. They have the ability to catch monsters in battle, then releasing them later to use against another enemy. Sadly you can only hold one monster at a time, and they’re gone once you release them. Still there is quite the wide variety of options available if you know what you’re looking for, and you can pull off quite a bit of cool niche stuff in the right situations. Whether that’s worth the effort or not is to be determined.
Geomancer: A magical class that uses the power of the Earth against their opponents. Their powers are based upon the nearby terrain (i.e. you’ll get sand based attacks in the desert, tree based attacks in the forest, rock slides inside caves and mountains, etc.) Some of these are decently strong while others leave a lot to be desired. The randomness of their power, combined with the fact that often enemies are resistant to their local habitats puts a damper on what a Geomancer can do, but they can be useful in the right situations.
Ninja: A premier physical class, Ninjas are very adept at wielding two weapons at once. They are extremely fast and can pack a punch. They also have the ability to throw weapons and items at an enemy, dealing damage proportional to the strength of the weapon. There are special ninja stars that can do a ton of damage to a single target, and there are also elemental scrolls that can deal magical damage to a whole group of enemies. While these scrolls don’t do the most damage with the Ninja’s base magic powered, paired with a magical class (like the Summoner we already have), they can really pack a punch!
Bard: A pure support class, the Bard has the power of song. Early on these songs grant status effects such as regen on allies and sleep or confusion on enemies. Later on, they get songs that will buff their allies stats, granting them increased power and speed. They will also learn a requiem that does massive damage against undead creatures. Finally they have the power to hide, dodging any and all attacks from the enemies (albeit not being able to contribute to the fight themselves while hiding). While the Bard sounds weak (and is quite frail), the stat buffing songs can really go crazy later on, buffing the party up to crazy levels of power.
Ranger: A physical class, Rangers specialize in using bows and arrows. This allows them to attack from distance, a nice boost to their defenses given their inability to wear heavy armor. They start with the ability to Aim, which gives them perfect accuracy on an attack at the cost of a small amount of preparation time. They also have the ability to call random woodland creatures to the battle, providing some strange, usually beneficial effects with them. Their ultimate ability though may be the best physical ability in the game: Rapid Fire. With Rapid Fire, the Ranger will randomly attack any enemy four times, dealing half damage with each attack but ignoring defense in the process. While sometimes the random targeting of it may be an issue, its pure damage output is more often than not well worth it.