~Beyond the Border~ > Akyu's Arcade

[SSLP] Darkest Dungeon: An admission of defeat.

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AzyWng: It seems the guarantees I didn't make have fallen through - I don't believe I will be able to have a post up by the 20th. Perhaps the 27th will be when I make my first post, but even then I'm not 100% sure. Thank you for bearing with me, I promise Reimu will get doused with rancid wine soon. Incidentally, I should probably tell you that this is not a blind run of the game (If it was, How would I know so much about the game's mechanics and classes?), so while we will be at the mercy of the much-maligned RNG, we will not be at the mercy of my ignorance. At least, we won't be at its mercy as much.

AzyWng: I've decided to write a brief in-character intro to this Let's Play. If you want me to keep the more serious style, I can do that, or I can continue to flippantly joke about the deaths of others as I've been doing so far. So, May 18th was when I first started recording footage, so we’ll say that that’s when our game starts. Mid-late May. So, after this super-lengthy intro, it’s time for a super huge infodump alongside the gameplay I’m presenting. Hopefully it won’t make your eyes water the way the free-response questions on my AP Statistics test did. -- It was May when the letter arrived. The brighter days were idyllic and almost... peaceful. Not that my employees could exactly stop to enjoy the sun, of course. “Raimbeaucourt versus Thibault! Final call for all bets!” A bar of brawny men, a desire to see blood, and a bit of ingenuity meant that life was easy enough. The crowds of fools who gathered were all too willing to empty their purses for a chance to fill them again, and some clever manipulations meant that I’d always win back more than what I paid out. And best of all was the crowd’s bloodthirst. No amount of violence, it seemed, could sate the desires of those who routinely rendered themselves penniless. Even a grisly set of killings from a bounty hunter a few weeks back couldn’t disrupt the fights that were going on, and if any of the fighters were killed, there would be more to take their place, eager for gore and gold. An ever-flowing fountain of coin... If one didn’t mind the blood, of course. Life was easy enough indeed, but the affair inevitably started to grow dull. As of late, I’d begun to notice the same moves and mistakes again and again. These men were not fighters, though they certainly fancied themselves as such. They were little more than belligerent drunks, interested in  playing up their own egos and filling their coin purses, relying on what they thought was animal instinct when it was little more than the whiskey they’d inhaled moments earlier. Thorough examination revealed their existences to be empty, joyless affairs that they attempted to fill by giving in to the base desires of wrath, greed, and lust. And I was indulging in these men’s desires for what, exactly? To line my own pockets with money I would gain no joy in spending? To gorge myself with food and drink, as the others had? To stuff my bedsheets and blankets with gold to sleep with in place of companionship? The self-mocking questions rang in my head like the raucous shouting of the betting manager - everpresent, yet always grating and sickening to hear. My memories soon began to blend together until I was seeing the same so-called techniques botched time and time again, and hearing the same so-called desires and same so-called voices of the ever-constant stream of the same so-called humans. Each day could have replaced the next, and I wouldn’t have noticed anything different. Perhaps the entirety of my own life could have passed through that bar like its patrons: Blind, confused, and ultimately accomplishing nothing. Were it not for that day... During a lull in the fighting, I was sitting at the bar, a mug of cool cider in my hand, when there was a tapping on my shoulder. Quickly, I whirled around, half-expecting another inebriated brute mistaking me for his competitor, or, worse yet, easy prey. I’d put down more than my fair share of those fools. Whether they believed they’d be getting an easy win or an easy score, their faces all contorted into the same shapes when they breathed their last. While the shows of violence and mercilessness would have garnered a reputation in a more sober populace, the memories of those here were little more than an ephemeral blaze - lasting for a few days before being doused by a torrent of blood, alcohol and other fluids. This was, after all, a place where patrons manipulated their own memories as they wished, discarding the unpleasantness like a broken tool. Instead of the unwanted fight I was expecting, however, I instead beheld a young boy. His clothing was simple enough, and free from the stains that were so commonly acquired during drinking, brawling, and other activities that were common at this place. And lastly, something about my visage and motion genuinely frightened him - he threw up his hands as though the stained envelope he held in them would soften the blows that would surely come. When he realized I would not harm him, he presented the letter to me hesitantly, not knowing what to say. The envelope the letter was in was nothing remarkable, and I paid the familiar crimson stains no mind at all, for I’d seen and even created the likes of those marks dozens of times before. The only particularly unusual feature was the wax seal holding the letter closed - the seal of a “Yakumo family”... I was not sure if I’d ever seen the symbol on the seal before, but the name alone meant the sense of familiarity was... uncanny. Caring not who saw the letter, I tore the envelope open and read. Again, the handwriting of the sender was unfamiliar, yet I felt as though I’d known it my entire life...     Ruin has come to our family.     You remember our venerable house, opulent and imperial; gazing proudly from its stoic perch above the moor. I lived all my years in that ancient, rumour-shadowed manor. Fattened by decadence and luxury...and yet, I began to tire of...conventional extravagance.     Singular unsettling tales suggested the mansion was a gateway to some fabulous and unnameable power. With relic and ritual, I bent every effort to the excavation and recovery of those long buried secrets, expending what remained of our family fortune on swarthy workmen and sturdy shovels. At last, in the salt-soaked crags beneath the lowest foundations, we unearthed that damnable portal of antediluvian evil.        Our every step unsettled the ancient earth...but we were in a realm of death and madness! In the end, I alone fled laughing and wailing through those blackened arcades of antiquity...until consciousness failed me.    You remember our venerable house...opulent and imperial.    It is a festering abomination!        I beg you! Return home, claim your birthright, and deliver our family from the ravenous clutching shadows of the Darkest Dungeon.     Enclosed with the letter were instructions on how to reach the manor he wrote of, but I did not see them, seeing nothing at all as the memories flooded back. At so many family gatherings and occasions, there was always a lone figure. The rest of the family had their eccentricities, that was sure, but this figure was entirely solitary, always with his books and texts, chanting odd phrases to only himself, and never seeming to even notice our presence. The few times I asked about him were met with blank stares and murmured words of a distant ancestor, dabbling in things that should not be toyed with. I’d soon learned not to talk of him, his doings, or even his very existence, just as I learned not to talk of the rest of the family as I matured.     But I still remembered. I’d nearly forgotten after the endless cycle of brawls, and yet here I was, this almost complete stranger begging me to return to a place that belonged to a youth I could scarcely to recall...     I knew what I had to do. Thanking the boy and pressing a small purse of coin into his hands, I stood from my seat and headed for the door, ignoring his small eyes gleaming with wonder.     I did not look back at the bar as I left, as so many heroes do when they leave their own homes for a life of adventure and glory. The bar was little more than a dalliance, a distraction - something to pass the time as I waited for something truly worthy of my attention.     It was no home. I was no hero. And I knew not whether I would receive either adventure or glory in these places. I knew not what would await me when I arrived at the manor and its hamlet. It could have been my own death, and I still would have made my journey.     It was better than this... existence here, at the bar.     Thankfully, I would not be making the journey alone. As I stepped into the stagecoach, the faces of two men greeted me. Dismas and Reynauld: Old friends, and of sterner stuff than those lumbering brutes back at the bar. Dismas was a former highwayman. When he had finally been arrested - his string of cheating and robbery had finally caught up to him - the family’s mercy granted him his life in exchange for his loyalty. While his pistol and dagger were in poor condition, they were still sharp and accurate enough to be lethal, and his quick reflexes and tough head hadn’t deteriorated since the day we’d first met. Reynauld, on the other hand, was a former crusader, turned another servant of the family when they provided the wandering warrior with a home, a purpose, and, even, perhaps, a new family of sorts. His own armor and short sword were, again, battered but functional, and his unshakable faith granted him strength during the light... Even if he did have a habit of taking things that weren’t his. I cannot recall how we met, and it mattered not. We were here now, and these two would see me safely to the manor.     The man driving the stagecoach, on the other hand, was far less familiar. A set of filthy, ill-fitting glasses and the neverending grin he wore only truly began to sink in when we were already on our way. Asking Dismas and Reynauld about his identity, I merely learned that they had been instructed to take the wagon, pick me up, and then bring me to the hamlet, where we would meet up with two more family friends, Eirin and Reimu, to begin the long and arduous task of cleansing the manor. They knew not who that man was, nor his own history with the family, but they had little choice in the matter, for none else would bring them to the manor. As soon as they finished explaining this brief call to action, catching up with what we’d been doing, the wagon lurched ominously. The horses began to falter and neigh in fright, as the wagon began shaking far more than even the roughest roads could possibly produce. The shaking began to become even more intense. I looked in the eyes of Dismas and Reynauld and saw fear begin to bloom as I remembered the written instructions of my Ancestor... You will arrive along the old road. It winds with a troubling, serpent-like suggestion through the corrupted countryside. Leading only, I fear, to ever more tenebrous places. Peering out a window at the landscape, I began to see shallow graves and even a number of dessicated, half-eaten corpses at the side of the road, as the wagon driver began to laugh, a horrible, unsettling laugh that raised our hackles and left us clutching at our weapons. There is a sickness in the ancient pitted cobbles of the old road and on its writhing path you will face viciousness, violence, and perhaps other damnably transcendent terrors. There were shapes moving in the forests, shapes belonging to vaguely human figures... and those of unfamiliar, horrifying creatures. The driver’s laughter only grew louder and louder as we continued... So steel yourself and remember: there can be no bravery without madness. With a final punctuation of psychotic cacophony, the wagon’s driver pulled on the reins hard, driving the cart far off to the left of the road as he leapt from it, a jump far higher than I’d ever thought a person could make. The old road will take you to hell... And the wagon was left with us, tumbling, crashing, left to our fates... With a resounding smashing and splintering of wood, I suddenly found the cart’s floor rushing up at me. There was a brief, blinding pain. And then there was darkness. but in that gaping abyss we will find our redemption.

Hope ♦ Metal: I'd say keep the serious style. Although it would be kind of funny imagining Ran or Chen even being the one that is doing this stuff.

AzyWng: The first drops of blood are spilled. A husk of a town. Then the pain returned. A searing headache. The sound. The songs of birds, already forgetting the brief disturbance we?d made. The feeling. There was suddenly a hand on my shoulder. I flailed out my limbs, struggling to get up, certain I was being picked over for valuables and that I would be finished off, only for my arms to be batted away. ?Calm yourself. You still live, praise the Light.? ?See, Reynauld? I told you he?d make it through, pay up!? Opening my eyes, I saw that the crusader had donned his helmet, with his sword at his side. He and Dismas shared a brief chuckle, before the crusader extended his hand and helped me to my feet. Climbing out of the wagon, I turned around to examine what the extent of the damage. The horses were entirely missing - likely having run off in a panic at having their guide abandon them. The wagon itself was in a pitiful state - two of its wheels had been completely smashed, and the remaining two looked ready to fall apart at any moment. Thankfully, we had chosen to travel light - all our equipment was with us, including the rations we had prepared in the event our trip took longer than expected. Though we were no longer on the roads and the place had long become foreign to me, I was, at least, aware of our distance to the hamlet, merely a brief walk away. With a little luck, reaching safety was still perfectly possible. Brigands have the run of these lanes... Keep to the side path. The hamlet is just ahead. We had barely taken ten steps along the side path before Dismas gestured to us to hide. Taking cover behind some of the nearby vegetation, we heard the sound of footsteps getting closer and closer. With a nod from the highwayman, the three of us each leaped out of our hiding places, drawing our - A hand reached around for a handle. It missed. Looking down, my heart sank when I realized the blades I?d packed had slipped from their sheaths during the chaos of the crash and were now gone. The lone brigand grinned, and drew closer, his own blades at the ready, but I was ready for him, too. All it took was a handful of dust in his eyes and a quick hand signal... Dispatch this thug in brutal fashion, that all may hear of your arrival! And then the fight ended almost as soon as it began, the brigand barely able to land a weak slice on Dismas before Dismas responded by opening the bandit?s throat. A brief search of his pockets revealed a small pouch of coin, and we continued. Just as we saw the gate separating one of the rooms, we came across a small tent - belonging to the bandits, it seemed. Leave nothing unchecked, there is much to be found in forgotten places. Looting another small coin pouch, we proceeded to the path to the hamlet... Only to be met with further resistance - a scarred, lumbering hulk of a man, whip in hand, with a much smaller, shorter brigand, wielding a rifle-like gun. An ambush! Send these vermin a message - the rightful owner has returned, and their kind are no longer welcome! The sprays of shot coming from the brigand fusliier bit into the flesh of Reynauld and Dismas, but the wounds inflicted were light and easy to ignore. Dismas returned fire with a weak shot, not for the sake of killing, but for steadying his aim. This tracking shot was accompanied by a precise slice, opening the hulking brigand?s veins to spill out his blood more easily. Seeing an opportunity, Reynauld then struck the hulking bloodletter over the head with the hilt of his blade before following up with a slash that cleaved straight through the giant?s flesh. Despite the grievous injury, the brigand bloodletter still stood, and retaliated by savaging the pair with a flurry of whips. While the cuts the whips made were quite shallow, they were painful nonetheless. However, Dismas and Reynauld kept their cool. Then, a wicked glint appeared in Dismas?s eye as he leveled his pistol straight at the brigand fusilier?s head... There were barely even any remains left. The battle ended quickly enough after that, but before we entered the hamlet, Reynauld called for us to wait. He?d found a small, unlocked chest, clearly belonging to the bandits. Though something was off about it, Reynauld gleefully tried to lift open the lid only for a needle to pierce his hand - the chest had been trapped! All too familiar with what that kind of trap meant, the three of us waited for the poison to set in... Only for nothing to happen at all. Reynauld merely laughed at our worry. ?It will take far more than that to slay me, brothers!? Shaking our heads at his folly, we merely continued on our path to the hamlet... Only to find it desolate and lifeless. The only signs anyone was foolish enough to keep living there were the caretaker?s presence at the graveyard and the replacement stagecoach, already carrying our two companions Reimu and Eirin. Welcome home, such as it is. This squalid hamlet, these corrupted lands, they are yours now, and you are bound to them. What was it that brought the hamlet to this sorry state? When had it degraded to this point? And how were we to rebuild this, of all places? -- Gameplay Explanation coming soon (TM).

the old guy: I like to pitch in by asking you to name the first Hellion (my favorite class) you get ether Yuugi or Suika, I'm not egotistical enough that I need my own name on a class. But, you can name a Man At Arms after me if you so wish, assuming you don't have a one request for user rule.

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