[quote]
I feel something really bad…and heavy… Yeah, it feels really heavy.
I think this is all coming from that place you were all looking at on TV. I think it’s called Daitou TV Station?
It’s going to be your first time going there, right? Make sure to be careful.[/quote]
So, last time Daitou TV was under attack by a possessed Barry. That sure went south fast!
…
…Oh, and I guess we got a new party member or something? I’m sure it wasn’t that important.
[quote]
All right, contact saved! This is Itsuki, right? Anyway…
Why did this have to happen now!? My first message was supposed to sound more like a Hollywood star…
[/quote]
Ellie is our resident archer, and like all pre-Fates archers, is fairly fast and accurate, passable on offense, and garbage otherwise. She doubles up on electricity (since we can’t remove Itsuki from the party), but she does get some fire skills to help with coverage and we’ve been wanting for bow damage since the first dungeon. Otherwise, there isn’t much to say about her other than the fact that she starts at Stage Rank 1. After all, she just got back from an overseas trip and stars in a TV show that gets really poor ratings. Why would anyone know who she is? 
On an aesthetic note, Ellie probably has the best design of anyone in the party. The rose arrows are a great touch, and Virion is far and away the best party mirage. Look at that fucking rose pauldron. Look at it!
And here’s the man himself, just chilling in the Bloom Palace. Let’s get acquainted, shall we?
Aha! Itsuki, I presume?
Yeah, that’s me… And you are…?
I am the noble Mirage partnered with Ellie… My name is Virion, good sir, and it is my distinct pleasure to make your acquaintance.
Oh, so you’re Ellie’s Mirage. It’s a pleasure to meet you too.
As you have doubtless observed, dear Ellie is somewhat… rambunctious. As nobles, it is our duty to refine her into a lady of class!
Um, I’m not really a noble or anything…
Is that so? Strange… I could have sworn I felt a kinship! An aura of elegance, style, and fated grandeur! But no matter! Those of regal bearing and great nobility must act with all the magnanimity due of their station!
If the mood ever strikes you, please, come by again for a chat! Conversation, advice, or witticism - all I shall happily supply.
[quote]
Virion is a side character in the first generation of Awakening. He’s a deposed noble from Valm (the continent in Awakening’s second act, which you probably know better as Valentia these days) who finds himself assisting Chrom’s army after a surprise Risen attack. His main character trait is being a massive flirt, but he doesn’t fall into the same trap that someone like Sain does, where it’s his only character trait of note. Rather, each of his supports builds on that in interesting ways, such as how he teases Lissa about being a spy when he’s simply writing home to his parents, his assorted conquests give him all kinds of connections to finance the army, and he’s quite adept at reading and manipulating people (which he dresses up as “fortune telling”), just to name a few of his exploits.
Of course, all of this is undermined by being a pre-Fates archer, so uh…yeah. Maybe next game, buddy![/quote]
Ellie’s only available radiant skill slows down enemies on the field, which isn’t much to write home about considering we’re already faster than them.
Anyway, now that we’re done with all our errands, let’s get rolling. Onward to Daitou TV!
Yep, this sure is a mirage attack.
Oh, Itsuki…
Thank goodness… You’re all right.
There was a big…shadowy monster that attacked me, but Uncle Barry shielded me and-
Where is he now?
Over there…
You’re going to go save him, right…? Can I come with you…?
Wait for us back at the office. Don’t worry, we’ll get Barry back safe.
Okay…
[quote]
no doubt about it, ms. maiko. looks like the station was just attacked
we found mamori! can you send someone to pick her up? we’re heading into illusory daitou tv station
[/quote]
Sounds like Touma’s got his head in the game, so we’d better follow suit. To the idolasphere!
It’s a…giant Japanese garden? Yeah, sure, let’s go with that.
I’ll be counting on you, partner! Now let’s show them how it’s done in Hollywood.
Illusory DTV is divided into two halves, with each one having the same basic structure. There’s a large central building with four exits in the cardinal directions, and a sprawling set of paths that go around to each of the doors. This time around, there’s a handful of tasks we need to do in order to set the stage and move on, but we’ll see more about that once we get inside.
New enemies! The Blackwing Knights are the big ones, because now that Ellie’s here, we finally have a good answer to enemy fliers. They’re packing the usual assortment of lance skills and are weak to bows and wind, so we can clown on them pretty effortlessly. The Phantom, aside from being dapper as fuck, is just another enemy in the ghost family - weak to electricity and bows.
This, incidentally, is the big reason we got Bow-Thunder on Itsuki. Ellie’s starting skills leave a lot to be desired, with only Lance-Snipe and Sword-Plasma as session skills, and absolutely no one can pick up from her bow skills without Itsuki as a bridge. Itsuki/Tsubasa/Ellie is probably the best possible party for getting her going, which is pretty unfortunate because that’s not a great damage-dealing party.
On our way to the west entrance, we come across an unlit lantern. Just keep it in mind for now, it’ll be important in a bit.
And if we poke around on the decks a bit, we’ll find another lantern and a new Performa (Garden Artistry) by the west door.
Red Mages crumble to basically any physical attack, but they are packing some Tier 2 spells so don’t underestimate them in large numbers. Fortunately, they mostly spawn with Phantoms, which are far less threatening.
And our last new enemy for the moment, Infernos are basically just big buckets of HP. As you can probably guess, they’re fire-elemental and hit like a truck if you let them, but they’re weak to most other elements, especially ice - Kiria especially just chews through these poor guys. Just be careful if Touma is hanging around, because I’m pretty sure this is the first instance of an enemy absorbing an element.
Inside the building, the door to the south is blocked off by an orange barrier…
…And there’s a demon just standing around here. Let’s see what he wants from us.
First job: Get the stage nice and ready! Turn on all four of the lanterns outside! Report to me when you finish, then we’ll go to the set inside and I’ll give you your next assignment.
I-I understand!
All riiiiiight. Good answer, good answer. I’m expecting good things!
(I guess he’ll lead us inside if we finish our tasks… It seems simple enough. We might as well humor him.)
As Itsuki says, it’s simple enough. Light the four lanterns, and you can move on to the second floor.
Now that we’ve spoken to the director, this menu option pops up. From here, we’ll head back into the main building and go out the north door.
Past that, there’s the instructions for all the assorted tasks we’ll be doing in the dungeon. It’s…nice, I guess? But ultimately not very useful, because you can always just talk to the director if you need a refresher.
Der Freischütz increases Ellie’s crit rate with Bow skills. She’s already fairly critty because of her high skill, and this just makes her moreso.
And Kiria trades out Lullaby Song for Zan. Really, I should have dumped Flux, but either way this gives Kiria more or less complete elemental coverage and lets her sub in for both Tsubasa and Touma as needed.
The north area is fairly small and there isn’t much to it other than the lantern. However, we can sneak down a small side path to grab a pair of Mazan stones.
The area to the east is incredibly small, literally a single path that leads out to the lantern, but it makes up for that by going down and around to connect with the southern part of the docks. That one-way wall is the other side of the one you can see from the entrance.
Ellie picks up Skill Boost and Itsuki takes a pass on Wyrmslayer. Wyvern Riders are flyers and half of them are weak to electricity anyway, so it’s not nearly as imperative as some other skills are.
Wicked Lips is a fun one, slightly cutting the cost of all offensive magic. In practice, it’s largely useless simply because Kiria already has the closest thing to a bottomless EP pool, so this just makes it even more bottomless.
Tucked away in a corner is a pair of smoke machines. They’re nice, but smoke machines are incredibly cheap to buy and they’re so useful that there’s no reason to not be walking around with 20 of them at all times.
And in the farthest corner of the first set, we find a treasure key and a Bead Chain. This one’s fairly easy to miss, and it’s probably the best treasure on the entire floor!
With that, all four lanterns are lit. We could go see what the director wants next, but we could use an EP top-off before doing another dive, so back to the office.
You know what? Sure, lay it on us Aya.
Do you know the late-night gourmet TV show “Food Heaven”? Despite being on so late, the show is very popular and usually earns a rating of 15% thanks to its charismatic host Himemaro.
Recently, however, the ratings have been falling. From what I hear, it’s due to Himemaro’s poor performance…
They’re taping Food Heaven in Shibuya right now, could you got to the Gourmet House to check on her? If something’s wrong, please let me know.
A food critic? Now this is something near and dear to Itsuki’s heart. Don’t you worry, Aya. If there was ever a time you had the right man on the case, this is it.
This is also the first point at which we have a serious prestige crunch. Between Tsubasa and Ellie, six of our ten 3-star prestiges get eaten up in Radiant Skills, and that’s before we even start talking about the six or so new weapons we could forge (each of which requires 3-5 3-stars a piece).
Ultimately, I settle on making the Lilith Rod. Not because it’s particularly better than any of the other options, just that Kiria is going to be the first one to need a new weapon, so we might as well have it ready.
Anyway, next time we’ll finish up the first set and see what’s going on with our wayward food critic. See you all then!