[fate/grand order] New years, new FGO plurks that don’t have Act 1 finale spoilers. Happy 2019, everyone! ...Also standard “oops I continue to have unfairly good gacha luck be prepared when looking in here if you didn’t” warning continue having to be made.
Knife power does continue to go strong this year as well. I was afraid it would die off again after 2018, especially since I had silly levels of good luck lately. (Quetzalcoatl on one pull? You pulling my leg??)
I mean, this time I didn’t get the “two 5-stars, one 4-star” level of ridiculousness that my last two guaranteed gachas were, but I did get an NP2 Jaguar Warrior thanks to pulling in Lancer and....
DOOT DOOT GOT A MUD like I didn’t have a 5-star Lancer yet so I was guaranteed someone new, but I’ve been wanting to get Enkidu since basically the moment I realized that they’re nonbinary. And also pretty. ...that’s all I needed.
Except they also make me sad and protective like immediately so I guess I have other reasons to want them now.
I want to wrap them in love and let them know they can be a person as well as a weapon.
I ended up bringing them to a bit of dragon teeth grinding as I was winding down for bed to try to give them some of that bond love.
.........We’re going to keep working on this, okay mixter??
.........We’re going to keep working on this, okay mixter??
enkidu................. 
I'm so glad you got enkidu, yosie!! I know you were really hoping for them at the start of Babylon and have only reluctantly come to love Casgil, so this is the clearly the best possible timeline. 
Anyway, this wasn’t my only successful pull. I also got the weird compulsion to pull for Musashi??? I heard someone say that there’s some part of the story that made them get real attached to Musashi, and then she won’t be available to be pulled, so I figured I’d do some preventative pulling. Also the 5-star New Years CE is both good and also super pretty???
I like musashi already from the little mini quest that gets you Saber gems
I threw about a dozen tickets in, which got me a number of things that I don’t think were especially remarkable (I’ve got like three copies of Over The Cuckoo’s Nest and its clearly super broken effect that makes it superior to the JP edition by 2 QP) besides getting NP2 Stheno with my first ticket pull.
But I also did two 10-pulls that I should have saved for Gramps or Fran’s papa, which like...okay the first one was pretty unremarkable (I got another copy of 500 Year Old Obsession for my 5-star CE instead of the super pretty New Year’s CE, though at least I did get the 4-star New Year’s CE, which is less pretty but still pretty), but the second one was...
First card gold???
Hi NP2 fox who I have doubled down on as the 5-star Support Caster For Me even with non-arts teams.
I GET MY FIRST 2030 LIKE A BIG KID???? I guess that’s worth the attempt on its own!!
Hi NP2 fox who I have doubled down on as the 5-star Support Caster For Me even with non-arts teams.
I GET MY FIRST 2030 LIKE A BIG KID???? I guess that’s worth the attempt on its own!!
Oops I stopped refreshing in the middle of typing stuff up just as I got responses!
relares: Thank you! I was saved from doing possibly silly things to the Enkidu banner by knowing of this possibility, so yes, best possible timeline!!
relares: Thank you! I was saved from doing possibly silly things to the Enkidu banner by knowing of this possibility, so yes, best possible timeline!!
This will go a long way towards making me happy about having CasGil, in addition to Rider Mo and imaginary book daughter support.
Even if they don’t seem to...really talk...come on you two........
RandomProphet: Musashi’s trial quest’s story was good at that! But it was more of a “oh, you’re pretty fun, so I’d be happy to have you but not heartbroken to miss you” so probably not worth being less than restrained with my tickets (I planned to save at least 5 for Gramps stuff but *oops that didn’t happen).
I was rewarded for my indiscretions, though. “I shouldn’t do a second 10-pull OOPS NP2 TAMAMO AND MY FIRST 2030 WHEN I RECENTLY HAVE PICKED UP A JALTER??? OKAY YES I SHOULD HAVE!!”
(I mean, I’ve always been okay with the trade of “get three Kaleidoscopes by the first few hours of 2018” in exchange for never touching a 2030, but having one is nice!)
And also I still nearly have 200 quartz with 20 quartz-giving interludes if I get some stragglers’ bond levels up and 3-10 strengthening quests depending on if I do a bunch of levelling (no, Blackbeard’s doesn’t count because he is not getting levels), so I’m PROBABLY FINE to splurge a bit.
mudboy
A good clay. Who I was going to only raise a bit but who instead got most of my EXP stores remaining after Christmas because they were very loving which made me inclined to give them more.
I also did not get musashi, but I did get Caster Gil. and spooked by D'eon and Seigfried And congrats on 2030
it's a bonkers CE
All of these were at least super successes (the first one had to have been a great success since I was over 40 EXP away)...yes, even the very small ones.
I was out of much bronze EXP and FP pulls were being unhelpful so I tried just getting enough EXP for halfway and Enkidu got me the rest of the way.
I’m sorry to hear your Musashi-ing was unsuccessful and that you got Saber-spooked on the way.
But thank you — I’ve heard good things about it and it seems like it will be a good fit for Liz as I transition her into my primary offensive support.
It's a great CE
It sure is.
Step one in project “let clay feel loved.”
As with last year, New Year’s Eve was spent getting so caught up in raising a new 5-star that I get to stay up to wish my friends in later timezones happy new year.
> half AP exp grinding, double chance of super success
> “Maybe I’ll spend some extra time grinding out mats to get Quetz’s burst skill to level 9 as a demonstration of love.”
> “Maybe I’ll spend some extra time grinding out mats to get Quetz’s burst skill to level 9 as a demonstration of love.”
(Though in my defence for Rider/Saber day, my only Sabers left are Brave Liz, Fergus, and Gilles, and more distressingly, my only Riders left are Boudicca and Blackbeard thanks to me shoving so much All EXP down Quetzalcoatl’s throat.)
I might also want to grind Octuplet Crystals eventually. I dipped way low giving Enkidu some skill love, though there’s a bunch from events before summer.
Oh hey, summer Scáthach procced death on the black Wyvern at the end of Deming i.e. the one that normally requires Shiki’s NP to finish. Nice. 
good luck with mud, they're very... stubborn about their weaponhood? it isn't out of not feeling loved or anything, it's more just certainty about what they were made for etc.
THOUGH THAT FIRST LINE ABOUT YHINGS THEY LIKE... I'll have to look at the original but iirc it strongly implies that the answer is actually Gil but they're being cagey about saying nothing measures up to him
anyway their interlude is gonna murder you : )
That’s fair, but I guess what I want is for Enkidu to allow themself to be a weapon whose opinions matter.
I am both a little happier knowing Enkidu might be just being cagey, but uh oh the interlude is a danger.
........man, I should have burned the extra Stheno. A 25% increase in death rate? Why did I want that? I might need a rare prism one day. Oh well.
Oh well. I’d need like 5 of them to get anything useful for me right now. (If the arts Mystic Code comes up, though, I may get more fffffff.
“Oh man, I only have about 200 quartz when Gramps and Papa are coming up. The second Tamamo and the 2030 was good, but things will be a bit tight.”
.....
“Oh yeah and 290 saint quartz fragments I haven’t converted.”
.....
“Oh yeah and 290 saint quartz fragments I haven’t converted.”
That’s only like 40 quartz but even so.
"I'm sorry, there's nothing I have any particular affection for. I'm making sure not to think about that sort of thing anymore, or rather, there's no replacement... anyway, I'm sorry." < here is the fan translation for the comment I mentioned!
That translation invokes a lot less “I have concerns my weapon child” and more “okay, touchy subject, that’s fair.”
Thank you for showing me, I’m realizing I forgot to add.
An improvement in self-esteem, I suppose.
Why does Caligula want pages
I’ve come to accept all the Casters want a lot of them but I thought I was safe in Berserkerland.
I’m about to run out of places to put my Berserker EXP. I don’t want to use pages on Caligula, and even if I were to use the spikey rocks on Spartacus, he’d be stuck again soon. I am about 20 Homunculus Babies in debt, as it were.
Congrats on your clay!!!
They are so strong now
There’s 40 Homunculus Babies in the shop in the first half of the year, and I have a project that I hope to pull the right Servant to allow me to do this:
that 180 of new material looks ominous
Which means I need to farm 20 more babies, and probably before the next story chapter comes out, since my farming needs will be filled up after that.
go yosie go!!!
It’s a little terrifying.
(Thanks on the congrats! I didn’t see that at first.)
Shinjuku Archer, who I also would like to pull but won’t go so hard for since he’s a 5-star, needs 216 of the same new mat.
But don’t worry! By the end of 2019, we will be able to get.......60 of them.
Even diverting all of them into the Saber Fran fund, I’m going to need to spend the equivalent of 13.4 days of natural AP recovery playing only the 21 AP node from which they drop. long stare into the middle distance
Granted, this is without considering whatever drops I might get playing the story. I did get several chains in Camelot without grinding them yet.
Okay, Yosie, this is dangerous but I'm going to try some numbers.
"The brain produces roughly 500 mL of cerebrospinal fluid per day, at a rate of about 25 mL an hour. This transcellular fluid is constantly reabsorbed, so that only 125–150 mL is present at any one time."
What would you estimate the volume of the cerebrospinal fluid vial to be.
How many Human Lives does Shinjuku Archer want me to Take.
Hmm, good question. They don’t tend to be to scale, so it’s hard to guess.
But I’d say that the bottom part of it below where the neck gets thin looks to me like something that would be around the size of my hand sanitizer (60 mL) and then there’s the bulb at the top that looks about a third of the size of that again, so if I had to guess...80 mL?
Which means it’s less than two per life.
If I’m underestimating it might be as little as 1 life:1.5 fluids.
Let’s say...low estimate of 2.5 a life, high estimate of 1.5 a life.
good news regarding the spinal fluid, once shinjuku drops the best place to farm for it does like one drop per around 30 ap
so if you just try to snag one a day until saber fran drops you should be set, there's enough time
Low estimate 87 lives (you can’t round down a life), high estimate 144 lives.
oh I just noticed you already commented on that WHOOPS
I'm a little tired...
I think Shinjuku Archer would argue you could round down a life.
I am truly terrible at estimating the sizes of things, though.
opalinesque: I mean, you’re right. That’s probably the more reasonable option. But I know me and I’m probably going to like...do the 120 I need in maybe four chunks of hardcore grinding.
slothdere: I guess the 0.4 part would mean they’d still have 75-90 mL left. That’s...possibly survivable.
The hope is that I’ll have Shinjuku Archer, in which case I’ll try raising his skills to 6 and also Babbage’s skills to 6, and then I’ll be ideally able to just do all of the Dead Heat Summer Race with Fran’s team.
Smart person: whose missions are played depends on the mat drops.
Me this summer, probably: help. fran.
Me this summer, probably: help. fran.
I probably have goals for this year that don’t revolve around the summer event but those are the ones most on my mind. I also want to get Quetzalcoatl to 9/6/9 (she’s currently 9/6/7) for...reasons.
At some point I’ll have available Lores again and then I’ll be in trouble. How to decide who gets them.....
I say half AP as though I have much to spend it on. Unfinished Servants include:
Saber: Fergus 15/70, Brave Liz 33/80, Gilles 50/bones and hearts final ascension? you kiddin’ me??
Archer: Billy the Kid 54/70, and no one else.
Lancer: Jaguar Warrior 60/70, ROMA 40/70.
Saber: Fergus 15/70, Brave Liz 33/80, Gilles 50/bones and hearts final ascension? you kiddin’ me??
Archer: Billy the Kid 54/70, and no one else.
Lancer: Jaguar Warrior 60/70, ROMA 40/70.
Rider: St. George 45/why pages, Boudicca 40/I guess???, Blackbeard 25/that’s all I needed for his interlude pages I’m done
Caster: A BUTTLOAD FOR SOME REASON CasGil 58/80, Geronimo 40/70, Paracelsus 40/uuuggghhhh why 5 pages, Mephistopheles 50/matlocked by babies, Mozart 40/I guess two pages isn’t the worst
Caster: A BUTTLOAD FOR SOME REASON CasGil 58/80, Geronimo 40/70, Paracelsus 40/uuuggghhhh why 5 pages, Mephistopheles 50/matlocked by babies, Mozart 40/I guess two pages isn’t the worst
Assassin: Hundred Faces 45/mat softlocked, Phantom 35/I guess I have lanterns now???
Berserker: Darius Age 3 60/I guess I could put my extra Berserker EXP there but 20 bones???, Caligula 50/55 until matlocked, Spartacus 30/those ascension requirements are too rich for my blood
Berserker: Darius Age 3 60/I guess I could put my extra Berserker EXP there but 20 bones???, Caligula 50/55 until matlocked, Spartacus 30/those ascension requirements are too rich for my blood
spartacus takes down the oppressors by taking all their materials
remove the rich from power
I am stocking up on Archer EXP (I’ll doubtless throw at least a pull at Gramps, but I’m going to focus on trying to get Archer of Shinjuku for primarily summer event reasons but also charisma with a bonus to evil Servants? This could only be pandering to me more if it was a bonus for chaotic Servants.
Hahaha! Yeah, that makes sense.
Soon you’ll find me in London, seeking babies.
I think I had a decent setup against it at one point, but all of my non-daily teams got shook up in the finale so it’s gone.
Maybe I should go Mordred (Halloween Princess), Saber Shiki (probably same really), and Liz (I have a 2020 now!!). Liz can be extra sure about the weak archers and also she’s just Superbuff Extraordinaire, 40% party wide, 60% against one enemy
My 10/10/10 Liz is one of my prides and joys.
Gosh, though. I haven’t used Nero in so long. She was so good to me, too. I need to find an excuse to use her but also 1) Saber Shiki has been similarly unfairly ignored for having been such joy when first summoned and 2) Mordred is...strong.......
I still love you, Nero.
Don’t doubt that, my empress and queen.
She was so good to me at the beginning of this year. What a trooper. An amazing help as I went from Very Weak to Not So Weak.
To my current form of “probably decently strong if she’d stop playing the game really suboptimally out of sheer stubbornness.”
Phone about to die. Time to stop pondering and actually finish off my AP for the day.
Me: Hmm, I’m running out of places to put my Berserker EXP.
Me at me: If you weren’t such a coward, you’d put it in Fran on the way to trailing her to 100.
Me at me: If you weren’t such a coward, you’d put it in Fran on the way to trailing her to 100.
leans in, waggles eyebrows
I find grailing 4-stars into 5-stars so satisfying and I fear that the moment that I grail someone to 100 I’ll unleash a desire I can never put away again, leaving me without enough to do this anymore. Because Ibaraki’s power in the latest story chapter unleashed the whispering “think how strong she’d be at level 100.....”
I call the Fran 100 thoughts my Opal Inclinations.
Ah, I missed a golden opportunity to respond to your eyebrow waggle with “I see we’ve discovered who is under that frog hood,” but I didn’t think of it until another joke was out of my mouth. Such are the perils of being half-asleep.
Current grail status:
Used: 10 (Liz -> 90, Drake -> 92out of salt, Fran -> 90, Ibaraki -> 90, Mordred -> 92 half to express that I like her half to lure out Rider Mo-san, Mordred But With Any Chill -> 90)
Owned: 6
Remaining to get in next two years: 19?
Used: 10 (Liz -> 90, Drake -> 92
Owned: 6
Remaining to get in next two years: 19?
I’d have to think if I had enough grails left for 4-star -> 90 projects or if I ever gave in and grailed Medea to 80 before I did anything, though.
Thoughts for a later date.
Conclusion: I’m putting off this decision until the Dead Heat Summer Race. I will have more than 7 grails but fewer than 12, so I can raise Saber Fran to 90 and then if a Fran goes to 100 that’ll be the choice to make them with the 5 available grails.
In my attempt to not get too big of a head about how man Saint Quartz to avoid things like New Year’s when I was so hyped up about the guaranteed gacha that I threw two 10-pulls and a bunch of tickets at the New Year’s banner mainly because it was a holiday, I’ve been sitting on my saint quartz fragments for a while.
Just passed 300 of them...which is actually only a bit over 40 quartz but still.
I should have been good and saved my quartz to have an extra pull or two for Gramps, but the second one sure rewarded me.
Is it silly that I am sitting here all 
?? BUT HOW WAS YOSIE’S GREED REWARDED... 
?? BUT HOW WAS YOSIE’S GREED REWARDED...
Even though you said so earlier
I was briefly fooled
Hahaha, I was rewarded in less flashy ways than the GSSR pull of clay, but I do love the Tamamo/Mash combination and now both have gotten their NP levels upgraded at the end of the year!
Alas, no further reward and I’m going to make sure to finally actually sit on my tickets until an old man of some kind comes by!!! (Watch me fail this promise.)
Hey Yosie so I heard that the newest Kintoki interlude features Ibaraki --
....!!!!!
Thank you for letting me know! throws a ticket at Kintoki rate up not actually but I should see if anyone uploads it anytime soon.
There was a person on reddit but they link they provided looked sketch so I didn't click it.
For those wondering what happened to Ibaraki during ... here if you want to risk it
I’m...not quite that obsessed with Ibaraki to click such a weird link. Close, but not quite.
Thank you for the information, though! I don’t seem to have other places to find the text, but maybe one day!
It's a safe link! It's how microsoft shortens onedrive links
hence "1drv (onedrive) dot ms (microsoft)" lol
Good to know! I didn’t recognize it. Thanks, Opal.
np 
Oh and with that name, it turns out that this video was actually the right thing despite having Shuten as the person in both previews: 
[FGO NA] Interlude: Kintoki's Oni Slaying at Mt. One...
[FGO NA] Interlude: Kintoki's Oni Slaying at Mt. One...
So two options!
Youtube seems much safer to me so thank you for finding that!
I found it largely because on my phone I have to squint through information on the individual pictures to get at the text.
So I burst into Mira’s FGO plurk to brag about my silly level of investment in skills. I should feel bad for tooting my own horn in someone else’s plurk but instead it just makes me wanna brag more.
BRAGGING ABOUT THIS GAME BEGINS HERE
BRAGGING ABOUT THIS GAME BEGINS HERE
Servants with 10/10/10 skills: Liz, Drake, Ibaraki, Fran, Jalter, Mash (6, the chosen ones)
Servants with two level 10 skills: Saber Shiki, Mordred, Tamamo, Helena, Caster Liz, Ruler Martha (6 across only three classes, weird)
Servants with two level 10 skills: Saber Shiki, Mordred, Tamamo, Helena, Caster Liz, Ruler Martha (6 across only three classes, weird)
Servants with one level 10 skill, other two skills levels 6+: Euryale, Robin Hood, Lancer Kiyohime, Queen Medb, Rider Mo-san (5)
Servants with one level 10 skill, at least one skill below 6: Archer Artoria, David, Jeanne d’Arc Alter Santa Lily, Santa Alter, Shakespeare (an audible sound of regret), Hans, Summer Scáthach (7, and a feeling of guilt)
Servants with one level 10 skill, at least one skill below 6: Archer Artoria, David, Jeanne d’Arc Alter Santa Lily, Santa Alter, Shakespeare (an audible sound of regret), Hans, Summer Scáthach (7, and a feeling of guilt)
(guilt over the ONE LEVEL 4 SKILL MMMMM)
Oops I forgot Medea in one level 10, others 6+! So that’s 6 now,
.
.
AND KNIFE SHIKI IN THE OTHER ONE so 8 and a feeling of guilt.
Servants with no level 10 skills but all skills 6+: Nero, Enkidu, Quetzalcoatl, Hassan of Serenity, Asterios (5)
Servants with no level 10 skills but two skills 6+: Artemis, Nobunaga, Jaguar Warrior, Nursery Rhyme, Stheno (why am I like this), Hassan of the Cursed Arm, Vlad III, Kiyohime (8 and a worry about nerdy glasses emotes)
Servants with no level 10 skills but two skills 6+: Artemis, Nobunaga, Jaguar Warrior, Nursery Rhyme, Stheno (why am I like this), Hassan of the Cursed Arm, Vlad III, Kiyohime (8 and a worry about nerdy glasses emotes)
Servants with single skill level 6-9 and otherwise lower: Kid Gil, Cú (Prototype), Cú (Fate/Stay Night), Leonidas I, Marie Antoinette, Ushiwakamaru, Irisviel, Carmella, Henry Jekyll (9)
I’m too tired to work out things like number of Servants with at least one level 1 skill, but gosh I’ve been hit with the tired stick, so
BRAGGING ABOUT THIS GAME NEVER TRULY ENDS IN THIS PLURK BUT THIS SESSIOM ENDS HERE
BRAGGING ABOUT THIS GAME NEVER TRULY ENDS IN THIS PLURK BUT THIS SESSIOM ENDS HERE
it's okay Yosie, power level bragging is traditional in fate
can shiki kill servants? yes when she has level 10 skills!
oh man yosie you do so much skill leveling
griffie: Thank you, I needed that laugh. Gosh, even with my limited experience with the fandom I’ve seen those power level debates. It sure is a Fate tradition. I almost feel like I should feel bad, haha. Those debates are the worst — wait, no, there are way worse things about this fandom but it is something that makes me shake my head.
aureatian: Yet another way in which we look across at each other playing the game and go “how do you live like this???” at exactly the same time.
Except after a moment of surprise, your way makes sense with your more focused view of the game, and also I know I’m ridiculous — although a part of what makes me ridiculous is that I look at the actual numbers and think “wow, that’s not nearly enough.”
“I’m one fewer than having half of all my Servants with at least two skills 6+?? I’m slacking off.”
Actual feeling of slacking off “why do I still have level 1 skills on anyone I don’t hate I have so many blue gems.”
watches friends suffer trying to grind hearts
did not clear AP after feeling so tired, so boots it up while awake to use the washroom (my AP just overflowed)
hmm.
did not clear AP after feeling so tired, so boots it up while awake to use the washroom (my AP just overflowed)
hmm.
(It’s probably better for everyone that it turned out to be a secret gem instead of a heart, but there was a moment of “oh good grief I play this one time and I get the heart what is this desire sensor nonsense??”
I love some servants very much and the rest are left to languish.
I love so many that they keep falling through the cracks.
Like I haven’t used Nero in ages even though there was a time that she was saving me repeatedly from myself.
I think my Nero is 1/1/1
Well, at least you did the quests to get the third skill at all. That’s the important bit.
Mine is 6/6/6, which is probably not her favourite since she worries about being depicted in the Book of Revelations riding the beast whose number is 666 in most translations. Maybe I should raise her Imperial Priviledge another tick.....
I am in physical pain.
Pages......
I made a noise like I’d gotten punched in my midsection.
pages are the hell all of us "blessed" with many casters must travel through
casgil... is hungry.
it's ironic because did they even have paper in mesopotamia
they give Gil a clay tablet magic book to be accurate and then make him eat pages...
that's why they're forbidden
forbidden snack.
They’re forbidden because we’re not allowed to have them, or at least not for more than a few minutes.
I do enjoy the mental image of Siduri lecturing Gil about his paper-eating and banning them, though.
I have a dream, but it won’t be fulfilled this week. But by this time next week, I will have fulfilled it.
Well, step one of my dream.
Watch This Space (except it’s really not worth the buildup, but I was planning to finish it tonight and I should have gotten some part of it done like...earlier today or yesterday.
Because it’s not worth the build up: I, lover of raising skills, was embarrassed by my 20-some Servants who still had at least one level 1 skill. So, as of this moment, there are no level 1 skills in my Chaldea. By next week, I will grind 13 Gems of Berserker and 5 Magic Gems of Assassins, and all of my Servants will have level 4+ skills.
what about those two EVERY SERVANT I ACKNOWLEDGE AS MINE WILL HAVE LEVEL 4+ SKILLS.
Oh my god. Yosie, you're so powerful...
yosie you go so hard
I like raising Servants. Impossible dream: I would love to one day have everyone with level 9+ skills. I will settle for my Merely Unlikely dream, though: of getting every Servant with three level 6+ skills.
I mean, they’re just level 4 skills. It’s not really so powerful.
EXCEPT MAYBE AT SETSUBUN IN A YEAR AND A BIT truly when my worth will shine.
That I go hard, probably too hard, is undeniable, though.
Pictured: going too hard:
POOR BILLY WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO HIM
or uh
please finish my boy
Fergus is difficult because he needs a lot of hearts
THIS IS HYSTERICAL CONSIDERING I JUST POSTED PICS OF THE ONLY SERVANTS I HAVE LEFT TO MAX ASCEND... which is still more than yours it looks like. h-how
I genuinely don't understand how you have time to get the mats AND the exp l-laughs...
aureatian: H...hahahahaha, I have now done to you what you did to me with Fran, I see.
The answer to what I am doing to him is “I couldn’t afford the bones for his third ascension until recently and then I was saving up Archer EXP for Shinjuku.”
But you were kind to me when I repeatedly whined to you about Fran and there should be one more day of half AP Archer EXP, so in memory of that,
with a bit of added service thrown in to make up for the trauma I have inflicted on you:
with a bit of added service thrown in to make up for the trauma I have inflicted on you:
And I guess I’ll have to raise Brave Liz earlier than planned, as even I’m down to 25 hearts.
opalinesque: I mean...the simple answer is that I don’t have the time, but this is the game I play instead of doing something productive when I’m depressed, haha.
Which isn’t the most unhealthy coping mechanism, but I probably should take some steps to get it more under control as a New Year’s resolution when I return from visiting family.
My counsellor and I have twice this year had to approach the problem of “using RP to deal with depression in ways that require us to talk in terms of addiction,” so I think this might be a sign to approach this game like this, too.
...But I’m also proud of myself for having more Servants done despite this, which I mean is part of the reason why this is my unhealthier depression coping method.
........twice last year GOSH NEW YEAR’S IS STRANGE I haven’t had enough therapy sessions this year for us to work on something twice.
I do have to say in return that, since you have trouble fitting this into your life, I am really impressed that you have been able to do so much ascending in the time you’ve had.
the thing is I don't... really... like I go for periods where I'm too burnt out to even pick it up but when I go I go hard, which is why I'm like "HOW"
I get that feeling some, though... I usually don't consider it an "instead of doing something productive" so much as a "my energy/mood are low enough that doing something "productive" is not really in the cards if I'm honest with myself" sort of situation though when I'm doing it when I have other things on my plate
The bottom left corner of this screenshot sheds some light on how.
And like I’ve used up nearly all the AP I naturally regen on those days, to the point that I allow notifications from this game in order to not let my AP overflow for long.
aren't the notifications broken? if they've actually fixed them I will turn them back on holy crap
And that’s fair! I need to be better about not framing what I do in a negative light, but also I also have been spending a lot of time at therapy trying to stop myself from self-sabotage, so I’ve slipped past “this is a coping mechanism to deal with the times when my energy/mood are too low” and into sometimes reaching unhealthy levels.
So, like, I have no plans to drop it as a good “I’m feeling too low to do other things so I’ll use this to relax,” but I really gotta scale back.
YEAH NO that makes sense! I was trying to communicate a different context, not police your language or anything
The notifications have worked for me! I wasn’t aware they were broken at some point.
Oh, right, that makes sense, though frankly my language around these things needs some level of policing, because I frame things in a negative light in my head a lot and that’s not helpful.
I grew up considering myself lazy etc. and it wasn't until I got medicated for ADHD as an adult that I gained the ability to distinguish in myself "choosing not to do a thing because I'm lazy" vs "I'm not doing these things because executive functioning is immensely difficult for me" so I've gained a very... finetuned awareness of motives behind-
my different types of slacking off, haha
rather, I say "slacking off," but I more mean that if I'm not doing a thing that needs doing there's a reason behind it, so I should hunt down the reason? ANYWAY. tangents!
I’m still stuck in the “consider myself lazy” stage of things, but that’s why I have a good therapist. I’m glad you’ve learned that self-awareness! And don’t worry, I started this particular tangent. It’s my plurk so if I talk about mental health suddenly in my FGO plurk, I guess that’s my choice though any farther and I should probably make its own plurk.
Great Successes on CE bombs are a weird thing. (Before the great success, it was still supposed to reach level 49.)
Using the fact that I want to grind Cursed Beast Gallstones as an excuse to try out a real Arts team, inspired by Silvie.
(Except I replaced the backline CEs with Bond boosts immediately after taking this picture.)
Thank you for finishing both my favorite three star boys Yosie
But then it will be back to grinding Homunculus Babies for Saber Fran: 
Imgur
Imgur
Oops in the time to find that link my battery basically ran out so NEXT TIME I WILL TRY ARTS TEAMING.
aureatian: You’re welcome. I don’t have the Fous to almost max Fou Billy yet, but like Kotarou I’ll put him higher on the list than I would have before.
That is a very good comic
Productive is the devil's word for me but I do understand that nervous poking of the word "addiction."
We love you, Yosie, whether you have a whole bunch of maxed servants or not!!
RandomProphet: Isn’t it? I sometimes regret looking too closely at Fate fandom, but then I remember that I’ve collected some nice Fran comics.
slothdere: High five to my comrade in figuring out mental health and how does it work. Thank you, and I love you, too, whether or not you are Strong in Video Games (but you keep on being that anyway).
We can sort through this poking at the word addiction together. 
Fate fandom is a perfect reflection of its beloved canon in that when it’s good it rules incredibly hard but when it’s bad it’s really bad
...Gosh, you’re right.
(Also I came back to express the delight that always comes the first time a newly NP2 Servant suddenly gets above 100% charge. Tamamo got 103% and I felt my heart fill.)
(...when Stheno does it, I’ll probably regret not checking what it increases. If NP2 increased the charm chance, it’d be nice, but a slight increase in death chance...ah, I will miss the rare prism but OH WELL the arts Mystic Code isn’t in there anyway, which is what I want.)
2016 feels so long ago now.
I spent most of August/September of 2016 making this exact team try to do daily quests over and over.
It was rough, with both Liz and Kiyohime matlocked and Liz’s NP isn’t the strongest as it is.
But I made it to the other side, pockets full of 4-star EXP, monuments, and QP. I’d say about 80-90% of Kiyohime’s Bond points came from that period.
I barely use her anymore, and if I use a Kiyohime it’s her Lancer form occasionally. But I knew an AOE Berserker would be very necessary when I barely had one Servant of each class, let alone any of them levelled, and Kiyohime with her strong NP and vanilla skillset did a lot for me at that time.
I’m glad I got a chance to finish off her bond levels.
...or, well, I think I am.
Did she burn you or everybody around you
Not yet.
But unlike the answers you’re allowed to give in the Halloween event, I don’t intend to lie, so maybe I’ll live.
*neither yet
So I was casually looking around the Singularities to see if Altera's interlude that just unlocked is in there (I know I can check the gate but that's CHEATING kidding) and uh.
????? when did this happen
I mean, I've outsourced my "knowing what is happening in this game" to Silvie so I could have just missed this and it's been out for months but also ????
Okay sure
.....there are crabs here HAS THIS BEEN HERE SINCE AFTER THE SUMMER EVENT TO ALLOW YOU TO GET DROPS OF THE SHELLS AND I NEVER NOTICED????
oops
Oh my gosh it has been and I've gone to a nearby spot for grinding nuts or something since then I am observant as fuck
YEP...
I'll have to check if that unlocked for me since I failed to participate in the summer event... I think I have enough seashells but having extra for medusa lily'd be good
Hope it did! I'm...not sure if it does, actually.
There's a place to grind seashells in Babylonia, anyway.
It did! It looks like it was plopped in after the event regardless of whether you'd done it, I'd even already cleared the node
I mean, it’d be pretty mean to tie one of the most consistent ways of grinding seashells for the next like four months behind completing a particular event.
But gamepress said something about “after you complete the last quest” and I was concerned.
Well that was an unfortunate team to accidentally pick into so many lancers, even if I'm not worried.
......Hum.
Like I didn’t have my buffs up, but also NP + crit quick card......hum
Never fear, I've returned with every buff this team can provide!
Wow, class advantage doesn't mess around.
Wow, class advantage doesn't mess around.
.........oops I lost concentration and used Mash’s invincibility before the NP turn for her taunt SORRY MASH.
OH YEAH THAT’S WHAT HAS BEEN HAPPENING I FORGOT THAT ARTHUR DRAINS NP BAR SOMETIMES SO I DON’T HAVE A TAUNT TURN
But thanks be to RNG that the homunculus went for Tamamo who had four defence ups and two damage cuts and thus 0 damage because Arthur would not have done that (she nearly died at one point even with these supports because she got focused during a rare moment that there was no defence boosts).
Gosh, though, despite the Lancer issues, I do enjoy this team. I mean, obviously. These are three of the best Servants in the game.
Also goodness I’m getting so many friend points this week. Thank you, friends.
It always warms my heart. I have maybe three or four people I don’t know on plurk friended on FGO, so I know most of it actually comes from my friends. Love y’all. 
I need more hug emotes.
Okay, I get the message, gramps, you really don’t want to come here.
oof
I’m not even slightly upset, because I didn’t feel especially strongly about him. I just like the gramps comics. And I’ve had incredibly good luck for all of 2018.
But I gotta show this off because it’s like a naked Kirei short of being memetically bad.
I am worrying about “why did I throw so many 10-pulls so close to Fran-chan’s papa being released,” but also one of them was NP2 Tamamo and my first ever 2030 so like probably worth 30 quartz??
Okay, now I have every skill currently unlocked at 4+. Heck yes.
...........I do have 13 skills left to unlock, though, as I have several Servants who still need levels and strengthening quests.
Next stop: 6+!! .....................very, very far down the road stop, but hey, maybe one day!!
Without thinking, skips past the QP earned section after a doors run. Apparently while I wasn’t paying attention I got a lot of gold drops because I earned 2.2 million in one run.
What the heck. 
I’ve been very careful about using Secret Gems of Saber as part of my prep for Saber Fran, but now that I have over 100 of them and like four level 10 skills between my two most used 5-star Sabers, it’s harder to motivate myself to grind the training ground. Especially when I have a huge pile of feathers.
But also that can disappear in a matter of moments, especially since I would like to pull for the fox Saber if I have enough quartz (almost entirely because I made a joke in 2017 when I had no Sabers that a neutral evil 4-star Saber was the only one I’d be likely to pull since I have so many chaotic evils), so onward, my arts archer squad.
..............wait. How long has Robin been this buff???
There are sometimes when I have these realizations that make me realize that, when it comes to noticing anything specific about someone’s appearance, Sherlock Holmes I am not.
I’m doing Altera’s interludes so that I can upgrade her NP (and, next bond level, her skills), and like. I was just reading today about Siegfried’s backstory when talking to a friend about him (on the wiki so WHO KNOWS how accurate it is).
And one of the things I read was how the Brynhildr equivalent in the cycle for married once to the Attila equivalent. Just today.
So I should have seen this coming.
So I should have seen this coming.
Or, well, wrong one. The Attila equivalent married the woman who fought against the Brynhildr equivalent, but there’s the “Siegfried’s wife” aspect that current Brynhildr would not deal so well with.
“Fighting such a powerful individual helped me to adjust the aim on my Noble Phantasm” is I guess as reasonable an explanation for an Interlude strengthening as any.
Dr. Roman: Brynhildr goes around killing mostly men all the time.
Mash, shrugging: All’s well that ends well.
Mash, shrugging: All’s well that ends well.
Like I mean we encounter mass murderers all the time in this game, but the lackadaisical response to “oh, Brynhildr tried to kill us? well, she just does that sometimes to people who can’t defend themselves” did feel a little odd reading it while waking up to use the washroom, half asleep but aware that my AP is going to overflow.
(I was up waaaay too late last night so this is basically like the middle of the night when it comes to my sleep cycle, so I better get to sleep again.)
"yeah, you know bryn, big murders"
“Shouldn’t we be a little concerned she’s wandering around the Singularity doing her murder thing?” “Look this interlude is pre-Babylonia conversation about deaths in Singularities we don’t have to worry.”
No wonder I got Altera. More “well I kind of destroy everything I touch but maybe I won’t do it anymore BUT PROBABLY WILL oops.”
I love her
She’s great.
As funny as it is that she’s so uncertain whether it’s right to be here since she destroys everything while Ibaraki, Mordred, Fran when she gets angry, etc., etc. run around in the background.
I GET THE WORRY but this is not a Chaldea that you need to worry about that in.
mental landscape on fire, sips from mug
I was poking around to see if there was any data on which node is most efficient for the Moon Goddess event and I discovered that we'll be getting 36 lores total this year, with maybe three more for me for reruns with grails? I'm so pleased.
I bet you I can use all 36 but hey I'm not as deadended on skill levels as I thought I was!
(I did eventually find such a guide where I should have looked in the first place.)
(Grinding out some dragon teeth to make Atalanta strong for dealing with Artemis this event) I was both not prepared for how quickly Kotarou warmed up to me, nor how slowly Hundred Personas does. He went from like Bond 2 to 5 in about the time they’re sitting at Bond 1.
Apparently Hundred Personas requires 20k Bond points to go from 1 to 2. Goodness.
I know I read all of this when it first came out, but that sure has been a while, so I forgot most of the details and...that’s such a cute thing to say, Mash, my gosh.
I’LL GET THE DUMPLINGS I’M POWERFUL ENOUGH TO CARRY THEM ALL
It’s here!!! My favourite line in the entire game, even counting the real good story we’ve gotten lately and some excellent, hilarious events!
Ah, but as an early event, there’s that ridiculous, no-good stomach hole in Mash’s armour that I suffered through until London......
Oh! Right! Orion animation updates! I forgot.
Wait Silvie pointed out that I missed: 
I somehow forgot how cute Marie and d'Eon and Sanson were in this event. I was too caught up in whassup in my memories, I guess.
"Oh, for once I don't have to worry about Sanson's 'strength up against evil' skill -- WAIT ATALANTA RIGHT how do you get to be evil"
gosh, I'd be so much happier with Orion if things were like Artemis originally claims: that she's Orion and the bear is nowhere to be found. ...Frankly after getting used to the ridiculous fanservice in this game, I could get used to just about any of it if we could just...not...have the relationship between Artemis and Orion.
...Granted I'm none too fond of Orion himself but the relationship is THE WORST in my opinion.
It's the birth of Servants wearing Amadeus's silly mask in events a glorious day.
FGO really is at its best when it’s memeing.
Yeah I would also like it a lot better if Orion was just another goofy instance of a male hero turning out to be a hot babe
Just make it so the bear is a trained hunting companion that growls cutely or something. People mistook it for a weird dog.
YES PLEASE UGH THIS WOULD BE SO MUCH IMPROVED
I'd still take a while to warm up to the outfit, but it would be so much better.
("The samurai has a special dango in his sleeves" george is the one to drop gold dangos)
Well this puts a new spin on when I bring Altera to free quests.
I wonder if this is a reference to Altera taking war god Mars’s sword. (And then Artemis was never taken seriously again for all of Fate.)
The birth of the best FGO meme.
I didn’t end up with quite the destructive power Silvie managed, from a combination of not having Nightingale and wanting to have Mash in story teams,
but when she told me about doing 4x Orion’s health, I wanted to try it.
DON’T YOU THREATEN ME.
Good grief, thanks to Orion being Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Video, this was the best representation Artemis gets in Fate ever, save for a three second non-speaking, shadowy flashback in Apocrypha.
What an awfully low peak. Ugh.
Gosh, I'm looking at the joking villain list of my high bond levels and I'm realizing: out of the Servants I have grailed, only Drake is not the antagonist of the story/historical event they come from, and even she depends on who you ask.
Rider Mordred at least gives me one good-aligned grailed Servant. They're all Chaotic, though, which isn't a surprise (1 Good 2 Balanced 2 Evil).
I did the Goddess rank free quest to test out my theories for team setup, and I discovered that Stheno being a shadow Servant made her significantly more dangerous to me even though the other two were lessened.
Me with my: “Male Servants? You mean Robin Hood? Or Vlad? ...who else could you be talking about? Maybe David???” (I mean, I like a number of my male Servants and have some strong ones, but I haven’t used any of them in months.)
I guess I’ve used Hans and Cursed Arm more recently, and probably some others, BUT POINT IS with my team of Liz/Enkidu/Nursery Rhyme, I felt safe leaving Stheno to last. “What’s she going to do, somewhat lower my defence?” And then I saw her do the Shadow Servant NP thing.
Anyway hooray for having three Lores! ...don’t plan to use any of these three for a while but HOORAY FOR LORES!!
I realized that, to deal with the demon in the front of the Expert 40 AP, that I ought to have Riders in addition to an Archer. (I initially had Fran as one of the members, which went fine but has too much chance of Fran being defeated, which is NOT ALLOWED.)
I put Quetzalcoatl as the first Rider, but then when it came to an Archer and a second Rider...it didn’t occur to me at the time since the second Rider was replacing Fran but it’s the Pendragon beach day.
Arthur gets to (reluctantly) go with Mordred (excitedly) on a summer vacation.
You might only need one Rider... At least, Kintoki can one shot the caster add if you give him a NP start CE
I'm sure Quetz could as well
(Of course, that doesn't mean you have to interrupt the vacation if it's working well)
Quetz could absolutely take out the demon on her own! But since I’m running four shop CEs and a MLB 3-star, the demon dies before I’m reasonably going to have NPs up, especially since I want to have Artoria’s up. (Wow, I just wrote Altria. Truly I am tired.)
So the second Rider speeds up taking the demon, and then I can take out the last wave in a turn or two, depending on if I also have Mordred’s and/or Quetz’s NPs up at the time.
If I wasn’t focused on AP efficiency and went instead with time efficiency, I could slap Kaleidoscope on Quetz, Lucha Libre my NP to full, and have a couple of Archers/Berserkers just attack the third wave to death.
(Well, I say absolutely without having tested it. I just trust in my benevolent goddess.)
The second thing is basically the strat I used - Kintoki with a NP CE, someone's friend waver, and Arjuna
I have Arjuna hit the caster a couple times in the first turn before Kintoki nukes it, then use Waver to boost Arjuna's NP and swap him out with Merlin for the last 20% and buffs
It's "two turns" but with all the buffing it probably takes the time equivalent of more...
Eh, if you didn’t do all the buffing, you’d have to wait through the enemy attacks, which........well, I guess you probably run on sped up versions so not as long as for me!
Yosie Bragging That Is Actually Kind Of A Self Burn When You Consider How Much Time Must Have Been Devoted To This Game To Have This Happen upcoming:
I like Fous.
There's also some double digit scores scattered around, but I didn't bother to mark those down.
I don't actually know if this is an unusual amount of Fouing since there's a limit to how many anyone can actually have, but I'm feeling pretty happy about this after using the event Fous, so here it is.
using fous is super satisfying!
I really want to get all of my gold servants max fou'd someday
but for now I'm satisfied with all of my five stars
The dream.
Given that there are so many events giving Fou that come more often than new golds come into the fold, that should happen even without spending any more mana prisms.
I only just got my 5-stars do — oh wait, Raikou. I FORGOT I HAD ANOTHER ONE I thought finishing up Altera got all my 5-stars at least to 950.
( taking in a worried breath, then in the same tone of voice as I say oh, I'm running low on QP: ) I only have 53 golden apples...maybe I should be more careful about using them.
I KNOW IT'S SILLY, BUT I END UP FEELING LIKE THIS ANYWAY.......
I know the feeling though...
I've been using silver apples on this event because it feels less wasteful
I’m also worried about running out of silver apples, hahaha.
Even though I have 34 silver apples, too....
But I used a few apples and finished the parts of the event shop I want so I can move back to grinding mats with the terrible drop rates.
I know the drop rates are terrible but I keep getting hearts tonight
I've been blessed
I’m so happy for you! That’s incredibly unlikely but so very helpful.
Once again, I make my own job harder by inflicting silly restrictions on myself for story. Which in this case the most difficult one being “use story support Dantes as your main damage dealer.”
The other self-imposed restriction is “only Evil souls may find me in le Chateau d’If” but like the only problem that causes is not being able to use Mash’s defensive skills because I have so many Evil Servants.
Dantes nearly died, though, so I’ll have to consider whether I need to bring a second damage dealer to the frontlines or if I just need to play the current one better.
First sin, contained by Dantes. (I’m not going to make that another requirement, but I will do it if I can.)
(Also I know that it’s not just Evil people who will be in Chateau d’If’s story, but hey this seemed neat. And back to grab just a little more shuteye before I have to get up to exchange blood for arcane knowledge.)
First bones, then a heart and three claws? Chateau d'If, you're too kind. 
(Dantes screaming in the distance.)
(Dantes screaming in the distance.)
2/2 on bosses defeated by Dantes, but it’s already getting difficult to keep everyone up without defence buffs or strong DPS.
I may have to swap Ibaraki or Jalter into the front, as nice as it is to have the crit stars of Caster Liz with a 2030 (this thing is a gem).
chateau d'if is good for riches if nothing else
I mean, I guess in a roundabout way that’s how it happened to Dantès. (As you can probably tell by me suddenly remembering the accent, I looked up the Wikipedia summary to make sure this was actually true in any way.)
PUMPS BOTH FISTS INTO THE AIR I GOT THE 20 HOMUNCULUS BABIES which I will then sit on until like August because Saber Fran wants 60 of these and shops have 40 between then and her release.
I've got a bunch of Servants who want homunculus babies, too, but I've been doing a lot of grinding so let's just set this aside for now.
...gosh, I thought this would take longer. I haven't thought about what I'll grind between here and Shinjuku.
Wise brain: Grind some doors for QP.
More likely to be followed brain: I wonder whose skills I next want to raise to 9?
More likely to be followed brain: I wonder whose skills I next want to raise to 9?
(9, not 10, because I only have enough Crystalized Lores for Saber Fran so I have to wait for Dantes to give me one.)
Step 1: I should see what skills I want to raise to see what I need to grind.
Step 2: I should write these down so I don't lose track of them.
Step 3: Maybe in a spreadsheet? I make these and then abandon them, but for now it'll be a good idea. All I have to do is make a lis --
Step 2: I should write these down so I don't lose track of them.
Step 3: Maybe in a spreadsheet? I make these and then abandon them, but for now it'll be a good idea. All I have to do is make a lis --
Step 4: ????
Step 5: I think I should add an internal border on the colours for the table that I will be abandoning by like the end of the week, so that it looks nicer to me.
Step 5: I think I should add an internal border on the colours for the table that I will be abandoning by like the end of the week, so that it looks nicer to me.
Wait how did I get here
3/3 uh oh I may have to actually put forth the effort to secure Dantès kills on every sin.
He also got the final blow on Gilles, though I realize that this might not be the most difficult thing if I can keep the frontline alive since he’s competing with...two Casters.....
I’ve made Caster Liz strong and I think her NP might actually do the most damage of my Caster NPs, but she’s not against Assassins so she’s here as my crit support Servant (I make do).
I came very close this time to bringing Jalter out front instead of Tamamo to be able to defeat the enemies in time, but so far I have managed to keep it down to just Avenger and my support through my Casters.
Jalter is going to come out at one point. Who better to fight the final boss than an Avenger tied to Jeanne d’Arc?
(Speaking of, Jeanne continues to be The Best. I think of her as “Silvie’s Servant,” but I wouldn’t be sad if she came to my Chaldea.)
I CAME SO CLOSE TO AVOIDING THOSE NPs.
Now Tamamo is way less healthy than I'd like, especially going into a Berserker. Go go defence up rangers....
.................okay that was just supposed to be an arbitrary inclusion but MIGHTY MORPHING POWER RANGERS.......
DAMMIT A BERSERKER CRIT ON TAMAMO AT THE MOMENT SHE CHARGED HER NP welp Jalter enters the stage early for the first time.
..............no, this is Dantes's fight WITHDRAW AND REGROUP.
WITHDRAWING IS PROBABLY STORY-WISE REAL BAD FOR MY SOUL BUT WITHDRAW AND REGROUP.
LMFAO, YOSIE, PLEASE
I WILL HAVE MY PERFECT STORY OR I WILL NOT COME OUT OF CHATEAU D’IF AT ALL!!!
There we go. In addition to the shameful withdrawal, I avoided another shameful withdrawal by resetting a turn once when Liz got oneshot by a Caligula Buster Crit and I decided to stop trying to save the crit stars of Performance Continuation.
(It was a triple NP turn, so the stars were useless.)
That was not done super well, but I have retained my story pride: I am only supporting Dantes, who is story-wise the only Servant I have:
Jalter and possibly Ibaraki will come out when this is no longer the case — after Jeanne’s attempts to reach Dantes, we send in her sister.
(More on “Yosie is too fussy about the story”: when I have to retry a story mission, I don’t skip the cutscene. I fast forward to it, as, even though this doesn’t affect the game in 99.999% of circumstances, I must pick my “canon” answers each time.
But okay, this close encounter has made me decide that this event’s Crystalized Lore will go to giving Tamamo a shorter cooldown on her defence buff in order to increase my chances of taking Dantes all the way.
Time to...go to Hyde Park...I guess......
I only need 5 pages since I held back on using pages too much — sometimes (glances as Mozart’s third ascension).
So not too bad.
.......wait I got another page in like the next run holy crap.
???????
That’s...three in a row of at least one page, I think?? There might have been one in between the 2 and the 1, but I think it was all in a row.
(I threw another summon ticket for a summon to check where my luck went, but it was once again a 3-star CE. I’ve done about three summon ticket pulls over the past several days and they’ve all been 3-star CEs. I think I should just understand this isn’t my banner and save up.
I looked up the droprate earlier and was like “oh, I might get one drop with what AP I woke up with. I’ll have to decide if I want to use some apples to finish off Tamamo” and then I got this less than 0.4% chance (I don’t know the probability of getting two pages but it’s probably real low).
Okay! Sure! I’ll take it!
.........and then I do one run of Mt. Ebih and immediately get a gallstone drop. What is with my drop luck right now.
Watch out for lightning, Yosie.
I NEED TO GET STUFF DONE BUT I WANT TO JUST GRIND IF THIS KEEPS HAPPENING I assume it’ll stop shortly and I can get back to work.
Gosh, like I need another reason to stay indoors today. Twist my arm why don’t you.
This one...is going to be rough.......
Because I did get past the Rider midboss, but then I realized that, in my sleepy state, I forgot that one of my self-imposed restrictions is “only Evil Servants in le Chateau d’If.”
Which takes David off the board, which is a shame since I also am trying to restrict myself to “only using Servants whose main job is to buff Dantes.”
Which is rough combined with this midboss chewing up my Caster supports.
Proof that it’s absolutely possible with only Servants supporting Dantes, so now it’s time to scratch my head over replicating it with only evil supports. :|a
“I’ll just knock this out before bed,” thought Yosie, someone who doesn’t understand how she plays FGO.
It’s possible I’ll have to loosen my usual guiding principle: “keep the entire frontline alive.” I’m going to figure this out tomorrow.
What a puzzler. 
Fuuma technically falls under Evil. Maybe he can serve David’s role of keeping Tamamo alive so she can keep Dantes alive. That’ll be worth a shot.
He’s sort of a support, even if he will end up doing a lot of the damage component, too.
If I really want, I could stretch the definition of “support” to Serenity with her crit star generation, crit down, and seals on her NP, but it would kind of go against the spirit of “Dantes as the main damage dealer.”
I think this is the last day with story support Dantes, so this should be the last major obstacle(?).
Tomorrow’s problem.
Oh, Yosie. Fuuma will not do a lot of damage. Even against things he has class advantage against, he's a crit generator. Discount Jack with much less damage and much more utility.
That’s what I’m looking for.
I don’t want my non-Dantès Servants to do a lot of damage.
Even if this is a bad plan since this is Dantès’s NP with his one turn attack boost and a level 10 charisma skill:
Or else I’d go “Carmilla has a defence down, a crit star generation skill, and an NP charge drain. Support????”
So I guess I’ll give him a shot when I’m done my doctor visit rounds.
You...sure weren’t kidding about Fuuma not doing a lot of damage. Which is the reason I accepted him as an option.
I had to reset like four times because Dantès kept dying super hard when the dragon went “level 4 crit down? sounds like it’s time for 2/3 attacks to crit!!” I’m not super happy about that. But I made it through the dragon in the end.
Post-dragon went super fine thanks to Avenger class typing, though.
I’m a little unsatisfied about how that went, but I did preserve my self-imposed restrictions, so I’m letting it go through.
After all, I am
Anyway, yesterday’s Mt. Ebih continues to go well. Not as ridiculously lucky as previously, but nearly so, as I got gold drops (nuts, secret gems of Berserker, and gallstones) more often than not.
I’m going to take a quick detour back to Hyde Park to pick up the pages to ascend St. George, and then possibly a longer trip to Hyde Park to pick up the even more pages he wants to ascend again. That will probably take me until the half AP doors.
Which means it’s probably the last major mat grinding stop before Valentine’s Day and then I give my soul over to cerebrospinal fluid.
(Rank 10 in either of Quetz’s level 9 skills will have to wait. I already put down the Chateau d’If’s Crystalized Lore into Tamamo’s Morph A to help her get through the Rider dragon. But apparently Valentine’s has two so that’s an option. Or I could 10/10/10 Queen Medb if I get some lanterns.... The options are endless.)
Gestures tiredly at Fuuma. He's doing his best but he's a support boy
And that’s exactly what I needed to feel good about myself.
Uh oh. “Oh, it’s assassins! This won’t be a prob...lem....” Dantès you are made of paper with that final one who I assume is designed for Instant Death mechanics.
Do I admit defeat and bring “support” Hassan of the Serenity?
I’ll give it one more shot. Liz might just take care of a large chunk.
I feel I got pretty far under the circumstances!
But this ghost is an asshole that I imagine needs either 1) instant death or 2) anyone at all suited to boss fighting my gosh it was the return of the Attack Casko of yore.
If I had some way of removing that crit boost, I would probably throw myself at it with all my might, but that’s two crit boosts on someone who crits away a fifth to a quarter of Dantès’s life, meaning each Command Seal buys me, like, 2-3 turns.
I’ll sleep on it. I planned to popcorn.gif him, but I must away. If I don’t think of anything better by tomorrow morning, it will be Serenity and her “supportive” instant death.
There’s a part of me that’s frustrated that I’m not strong enough to get Dantès through this as the main damage dealer, but on the other hand these are challenge quests and I’m basically tying one hand behind my back.
(“But they’re pre-Rashomon challenge quests, they hardly count.” Hush, the strangely prideful and competitive side of me that only seems to care about FGO.)
first off: what you're doing is a real tricky endeavor! and I am honestly impressed that you've managed to take it as far as you have
and I also believe that, if it is possible to get dantes through this last challenge, you will do it!
that being said: these assassins are a real pain in the neck to deal with!!
that three tick charge bar is tough to deal with
here are a couple of my thoughts as to what might be helpful:
- hans might be a good choice for support if you can keep his np chain going. healing per turn helps!
- maybe bring dantes in partway through the big ghost? sometimes for harder quests, I have DPS A (frontline) and DPS B (backline)
with DPS B usually being my stronger pick, so they can go at the enemy with as many benefits as possible.
Thanks, Silvie. I was kind of hoping someone would come in to pat me on the shoulder and tell me it’s okay that I’m tripping at the finish line, haha. It makes me feel a bit better to read this.
gamepress has also brought up iri as an option! if you can keep np chains going with, say, iri + mash + dantes, maybe you could guts your way through it?
I thought it’d be nice to have Assassins since I did the first 5 challenges with two Casters, but ah, those 3 ticks....
(I'm trying to think of strats with servants I know you have, since I know you tend to keep friends list support servants in the backline.)
I did wonder if I could get enough healing out combining Hans and Tamamo, even though Hans would violate the “Evil only” thing I’ve got going on, but I hadn’t thought about Iri. :|a
but in case you're thinking of bringing support servants into the mix my thoughts would be:
- medea lily (healing!)
- mash (just stack defense buffs.......)
- scathach (quick buff + royal brand quick buff for dantes np)
- medea lily (healing!)
- mash (just stack defense buffs.......)
- scathach (quick buff + royal brand quick buff for dantes np)
(I mean, I can’t use friend supports on this since you can only bring Dantès. I briefly thought longingly about your Jeanne or Sarah’s Waver, but now I truly am only able to use my own.)
OH THAT'S RIGHT ... god, I forgot
the dantes is the support
dantes is your ""friend"" support
clearly a sign I should be going to bed soon... 
It is pretty late, haha.
I’m thinking I’m going to set aside Serenity, because I want to have Dantès still get the last hit even as I prepare to bend some of the rules.
Your belief in my ability to get Dantès to the other side has reinvigorated my desire to get that last hit on every boss on every day, as I’ve managed it so far.
My current thoughts for rule bending are:
1) bending the “Evil Servant” requirement to bring in Hans (or Mash or Iri) to replace the Liz crit star support. In Mash’s case, I could possibly make the argument that everyone else standing by Gudako’s bedside has made it in there, and in Hans’s case, I could lean on Fate antagonist position.
1) bending the “Evil Servant” requirement to bring in Hans (or Mash or Iri) to replace the Liz crit star support. In Mash’s case, I could possibly make the argument that everyone else standing by Gudako’s bedside has made it in there, and in Hans’s case, I could lean on Fate antagonist position.
2) bending the “support” aspect to bring in Ibaraki or Medea. Both come with the added bonus of being able to cleanse the crit up that is making this so rough on Dantès.
Ibaraki would be the option for swift justice, and Medea would be there to allow for Tamamo NP spam with not decreasing the number of Arts cards.
With Ibaraki, I’d do what I did last time and face “Mercédès’s” wraiths in my bikini (invincibility pierce), while Medea can better afford to lose the damage component of her NP and can allow for my Atlas Mystic Code (invincibility along with cooldown reduction).
Current status, I’m leaning Mash > Hans > Medea > Ibaraki in terms of what feels most legit by my standards, but I’ll sleep on it and do it tomorrow, because I also should finish what I started by crawling into bed.
climbs in through the window HEY YOSIE
................well. I’ve never bought a figurine in my life, but boy have you placed temptation in my path, Opal.
83c
good news it's cheap
That’s true, but it’s also a part of the temptation.
And there are cheaper delivery methods that probably won’t make it that much more expensive after shipping, though I don’t know its weight.
Was having trouble getting to sleep, so I ran an Evil+Hans team and got this far without Command Seals.
Wait, wrong picture. So
7/7 final bosses of the Halls of Judgment defeated by Dantès, with only one exception to Evil-only supportive Servant backup and that as a Balanced supportive Servant.
7/7 final bosses of the Halls of Judgment defeated by Dantès, with only one exception to Evil-only supportive Servant backup and that as a Balanced supportive Servant.
[Comic lifted from here. In searching for the right adjective, I also found a few more of this event.]
Anyway, I had to bend my principles somewhat, but the base plan of “since the conceit of this event is that Gudako is trapped with only Avenger by her side, I will do it so that it’s just Avenger being given resources” is intact, so I’m pretty pleased about this.
But since my phone is almost out of battery and it’s nearly 4 AM, I will finish the event when I awaken.
All right, part two of day seven: also known as thank goodness, an Avenger who does damage (sorry, Dantès, I’m sure you’re fine and you’ll definitely get strong later, but some of these have been a struggle): 
Jeanne wanted to stop him, so a Jeanne will stop him — just one more suited to le Chateau d’If.
Did Dantès basically sneak up behind Nightingale and hit her over the head or something for her to lose her memories??
holds up hand with two Command Seals missing, points to like 3-4 failed attempts
You don’t have a leg to stand on to call them weak, Dantès.
(counting previous halls’ sins on my fingers) So Nightingale was supposed to be Pride? I....guess.......???
Yeah, the comic Silvie linked explains that Nightingale trying/claiming to be able to to save everyone was hubris- aka Pride?
I did that last night too. And the game is like... basically Dantes starts calling himself the final sin? when it's like no, dude, that was nightingale's job
I was wondering what your plan was for this last fight.
I figured it would be something like that. It kind of works, but also it feels like an odd choice to me.
A part of the reason I’ve been so adamant about not getting Jalter involved in previous fights is for her to make her debut here facing against Dantès. But gosh darn it, NOW you decide to do damage, Dantès?? This might take a few runs.
also just in case you'd like to mess around: I'd be happy to move a damage ce onto nightingale
if you want to try letting mercedes kick his ass
..........oooh.
That sounds pretty cool.
I do like Jalter kicking his ass as well, though, so I might use her as a replacement for Liz in Jalter support.
I got him down to about 20k before Jalter died, but the rest of my frontline also perished before that. I like the idea of getting Nightingale involved in this, though I think I’ll keep Jalter as the damage dealer, even if having Nightingale beat him to bits sounds fun.
Time to refresh until Silvie appears on my friends list.
There we go.
See, that was part of the reason why I brought out the buster memes for that fight. nightingale was there and got to kick his butt!! ... by buffing jalter!!!!
Same strat? Same strat!!!
Also, ah, what good timing for Dantès to hit Jalter enough to charge her NP completely......
isn't that a good feeling?
It is indeed.
The next round was even with two more Jalter Busters, but alas, neither crit despite 60/80% chances.
.....thank you for holding on by the skin of your teeth my good fox.
I wish this one was repeatable, too, though. I’d love to see if I could manage a Nightingale damage dealer. Oh well. I like Jalter’s better.
I took a risk by giving Tamamo the guts, even though if he’d used Golden Rule, I’d be screwed.
But it worked and now I have two options open to me for defeating him. One is my initial plan: Nightingale NP into Jalter NP. End him on hatred spikes.
But I discovered I have a second option:
Both seem fitting. I’m going to set things aside in order to have, uh. Breakfast, and I’ll decide after that.
I’m leaning towards Nightingale, as a nod to the Nightingale damage dealer fight I’m not doing. I’m pretty sure Dantès would like the edgy dramatic execution instead, but it’s not up to him.
Rip & Tear
Rip & Tear!!
I decided to let Nightingale’s victory stand. There’s a pretty good chance that Jalter will get to defeat Dantès in the boss rush, as I’m planning to have Ibaraki as the front damage dealer and Jalter as the back damage dealer.
Whoops instead of having breakfast I did the extra quest. That’s where I was for an hour of literally only doing that.
I probably should have replaced Caster Liz with Hans for the crit star gen, but 1) I haven’t gotten Hans to as good of a point (Innocent Monster sub 10, crit boost sub 6), 2) I had forgotten Silvie’s Nightingale came with another 2030, and 3) look I love Caster Liz???
I started off strong, but I had to reset almost immediately because I completely underestimated Phantom’s NP damage vs Mash’s NP defence and Ibaraki got obliterated.
I didn’t want to have to move to Jalter and her lower powered CE immediately.
I did try to avoid my old tendencies to just reset when something goes wrong, and I think I mostly only did it for “wait, I started to use the wrong skill, stop it before it connects” or “ah, I forgot to click that skill before I started into the Command cards, back out.”
But that was like an hour time investment, so I might have just...forgotten doing it once or twice??
Anyway, I got pretty far without dipping too low in health thanks to Mash and Tamamo and the original Chaldea Mystic Code (the evade helped for my reset of Phantom’s NP, and then it came back up a couple of other times throughout, and the heal was real good for keeping Tamamo on her feet).
This one was with me finally using the mystic code attack up.
Most rounds were a repeat of first turn Mash NP/Ibaraki NP/Tamamo NP, eventually switching over to Ibaraki NP brave chain with the other NPs after, and then spending the rest of the time building up the NPs again, with Tamamo usually NPing a time or two to help that along.
But I nearly got in real trouble with the two Rulers. The first time I Ibaraki NPBB chained to start, I almost defeated Jeanne’s 172k in one round, with the second Buster and the Extra going into overkill. I thought: Ibaraki is pretty good at taking these guys down. I’ll hit the higher health Jeanne with the NP brave chain in order to not “waste” any damage.
I’ll just use Tamamo’s curse to keep Amakusa down — oh right he does have an NP charge move, doesn’t he?
Lucky for me, Jeanne held on with like 16k HP, meaning Amakusa only had one move each turn. So when he Baptism Rited twice, the first got eaten by Tamamo’s curse and the second did nothing due to doing it when he was already one away and had no extra attack.
I had an Ibaraki BAQ chain available, but Amakusa had enough HP left that I wasn’t sure it’d be enough. But luckily, I noticed Ibaraki was at about 80% NP thanks to a couple of attacks from Jeanne, so Mash could charge up the NP and let Ibaraki go to town with an NPAQ chain.
A couple of my friends had reminded me that Amakusa’s NP’s buff removal makes him unexpectedly deadly.
And then on the Dantes fight I was silly-lucky in terms of getting Ibaraki brave chains, so it worked out nicely for me: 
Tamamo got in trouble, but I was able to bring her along long enough for further chain luck:
This run was so full of lucky coincidences of enemy behaviour and command cards exactly where I needed them that I am pretty sure I couldn’t repeat this performance, but I’m pretty glad it worked this time.
Gosh, though. This has to be as close to a stall team as you can get with a Berserker, because it may not have taken the ridiculous amount of time it did for Mira, but that was pretty long for someone with a level 90 single-target Berserker.
I love Ibaraki. I may one day grail her to 100. I love Tamamo. I’m glad to have her to 10/10/10 now. I love Mash. I sure missed having her available during my “Evil Servants Only (And Hans)” story run.
Okay I guess I should have breakfast since it’s 3:30 PM and I have like 4-5 pills I need to take with breakfast......
And I have a ton of work left for today. BUT HEY FGO IS GOING WELL!!!
Threw about four tickets at da Vinci’s banner and like. I need to share the love with Victor of the Moon.
I checked after running a doors (half AP!!) and like...I’m not as over the top on it as I thought, as Drake’s banner had both Hakuno CEs on rate up so it got divided up...but like it’s not even on rate up!
This appears to be my first post-MLB Victor of the Moon unless I burned some (doesn’t sound like me). It’s Another Ending I have three copies above MLB.
They were my first MLB 5-star CEs, as I’d only been playing two months when I went off the deep end for the Okeanos banner.
Well, I get a second chance at that rare prism. 1/5 for if the arts Mystic Code I missed goes in the shop.
(I’m not going to do a full pull for da Vinci-chan, but she’ll get all my tickets.)
(I was debating whether I’d keep some tickets for Archer of Shinjuku but...da Vinci-chan is the greatest!!)
(I’ll just keep from tossing quartz after them.)
Clearing out what little EXP I collected recently for the bonus to Super/Great Success...I’m happy about this, but I’m once again super salty. If I couldn’t see her and I could only hear her, I’d love this Liz. If they parodied any other video game character...
I’m probably never going to stop whining about this because I dislike it so much.
A week of doors only at 20 AP a pop has been intensely boring. I've started playing Granblue again to get actual content in a mobile game. But I look at my stock of QP being restored and all is forgiven.
I spent the week just doing doors without paying attention and I'm like 50 million higher than I thought I would be. It adds up.
Yeah, it sucks to feel resource poor but grinding is... ah... unsatisfying...
It’s true. I mean I like doing dailies for mana prisms but I never really know what to do with my remaining AP
QP grinding is roughest for me, because it's both an intangible benefit for someone like me who hasn't run out and it's always the same. Every other half AP daily at least changes which Servants I might use. And EXP grinding is satisfying because you get to level Servants with it immediately.
And even my silly tendency to actually try to grind for mats in free quests usually results in working towards something concrete and immediate, since I only have one Servant that I've gone grinding for mats for before I actually get her or before I need them.
Yeah I agree, i’d always do the EXP and training ground dailies but I’d skip QP until I ran out of other stuff to do recently....
I want to say I've been good to always do my due diligence with QP grinding, but there was a half AP doors I think late last spring where I went I CAN'T TAKE IT ANYMORE I'M GOING TO GRIND FREE QUESTS INSTEAD.
But otherwise I've been a good child.