More Pencils

I finished up the pencils for pages one and two of the six page mini-comic I'm doing for the comic workshop. There's really not a whole lot to say about them that I haven't already said about previous comic pages. I used the non-photo blue pencils for the roughs like I did with the one-page comic and, once again, when scanning in on greyscale, they magically disappear leaving only the regular pencils, so they're still working as advertised. So, without further ado, the pages!

Page one is basically a bridge from the four page mini-comic (links to page one, two, three and four, for those who are curious to review). Modified a few things from the thumbnails but otherwise not much to add, commentary-wise.

Tried to do some fancy perspective stuff to start off page two, but it's definitely off - not something I'm particularly experienced with. The cars are also out of proportion with respect to each other (at least) which is another thing I need to work on (and relative proportions of things in general.)

Anyway, with the comic workshop done for this term, there probably won't be any more comic-related things until we resume next year, though I'm going to try to get a head start on the next two pages over the holidays so that January's a little less busy.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Comic Filler

On the previous meeting for the comics workshop, we talked about panel composition and various considerations (conscious or otherwise) that go into laying out content within a panel. Comic artist Wally Wood came up with "22 Panels That Always Work" (or see video version here) as a sort of visual shorthand - of course, theres more than just 22 ways to compose a panel, but it's a nice reference if one is stuck for ideas.

One of our exercises was to re-design a panel from our mini-comic thumbnails based on our panel composition discussion. Here's the one that I did (from page 6):And the three alternate versions:
We've also been talking about developing characters, both in the literary sense and in regards to approaches and techniques to designing the visual look of a character. Even though I did the character design for my major characters in The Word Smith over the summer, this still gave me the opportunity to design the civilian attire for the hero and his sidekick and the new set of villains.This is a set of concept sketches exploring possible designs for The Word Smith's civilian look (I went with the middle one), with a more detailed model sheet below:For The Pen, I only did a set of concept sketches (because I was being lazy) with the final design that I used being a mix of the first and second sketches.Finally, I did a single sketch for each of the villains (basically fairly closely based on how they were drawn in the thumbnails) and no detailed model sheet since they're just one-offs, basicallyThe fact that there's three of them (like there were in the first mini-comic) is really just coincidental. Three just seems like a good number, though I could probably have cut one of them out without much difficulty.

Anywho! That's all for this time. The next post will probably have the pencils for the first two pages of the mini-comic.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Word Smith Take Two

So, that comic workshop I've been running has still been going, even through NaNoWriMo and stuff has been happening. We're in the final stretch, though the workshop is going to run into January since we've skipped a couple of weeks due to people being away and will be adding 2 or 3 extra weeks of material related to figure drawing and perspective when all is said an done. But that's not a bad thing! It gives me some extra time to get ahead on my homework, and I might need it. After the one-page comic, we've started in on the final sequence of homework assignments which tasks us with creating a 6 page mini-comic. I've told my workshop participants to do anywhere from a 2 to 6 page comic (and they're all doing 2 pages) but as the leader, and because I'm a little bit crazy, I decided to do the full 6 pages. Hey, why not?

In order to make things a bit easier on myself, I decided to do the next episode of the 4 page mini-comic I did over the summer - it avoids me potentially starting yet another project that I might feel tempted to do something about at some time in the future and avoided having to spend too much time coming up with a new idea whilst I was embroiled in NaNoWriMo. I was a bit hesitant to just follow-up the summer mini-comic though as it seemed like I'd be short circuiting the character design process a little bit, but in the end I still have to do character designs for peoples' civilian outfits and the new set of villains.

The first task, as before, was to create thumbnails. I did my thumbnails at 1/4 size on two sheets of paper (conservation ftw), pictured below.

Of course, the small size (and my handwriting) probably means the dialogue's not terribly legible, but I'll be posting thing full version as it gets completed. The current goal is to have the first two pages fully pencilled and lettered by Tuesday next week (currently have all the roughs done), so they'll be posted sometime after that; some character designs might go up between now and then.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

NaNoWriMo Post-Mortem

It's been nearly a week since I completed my NaNoWriMo project and the thought of it no longer turns me into a mass of quiver goo which means it's time for a post-mortem of the whole experience. Isn't that what you were waiting for? Sure it was. So lets go!

This was my first time participating in NaNoWriMo, though I didn't sign up on the official website as I didn't feel it was necessary for me personally. I did see on a blog somewhere that previous NaNoWriMos have had about a 20% success rate, though I don't know what the results are for this year. Food for thought, I suppose, or some indication that writing 50 000 words in a month is no small feat. Anyway, on to my personal experiences.

As I said previously, this was my first writing project of any significance outside of FASS since... oh, well, I'm not sure, really. For my writing adventure, I picked an idea that had been rolling around in the back of my head since sometime in 2004. Overall, I enjoyed the writing process, though it definitely started to feel like a bit of a slog at the end. I think that succeeding in NaNoWriMo requires a certain amount of discipline and pacing; I was able to stick to my daily writing schedule and that certainly helps. Even though I never really wrote much more than the minimum each day, it was still enough to let me finish a day early - a nice reward for sticking with things, I guess.

A plan also helps. This is one area where I could have used a bit more work. I had done a little bit of background writing over the summer and made a short outline to get me started, though it turned out to be not quite enough. The outline got me through the first six chapters (about 38 000) words with the last two chapters being made up as I went along. Ordinarily, I'd have stopped, thought about things a bit more and then continued, but NaNoWriMo doesn't really accomodate that very well. Fortunately, by the end of chapter six, things had enough momentum to keep going. Though I'm not too sure how much a significantly more detailed outline would have helped as unexpected things kept happening, things happened in ways I didn't anticipate and characters developed in ways I hadn't originally thought of. But that's good! I like that about writing and I think it's part of how I do these things, so having an overall premise in mind (which I did) while coming up with an outline in chunks and then filling in the details as I go and changing the outline as necessary seems to suit me. Naturally, others' clickage will vary.

Of course, a lot of what I wrote was probably crap, but quality is not the point of NaNoWriMo. The point, for me, was just to force myself to write something, regardless of quality or anything else. I've been wanting to try to writing a novel for a long time; it's one of those things that I keep thinking that I should do but never get around to actually doing so NaNoWriMo was, for me, the metaphorical kick in the pants to do some writing. And I think that the ideas I came up with whilst writing are usable - it just needs a lot of polish.

So what's next? Well, I have to step back, look at what I wrote, and figure out where I want to take the story (I figure it's maybe a quarter or so complete, but we'll see). Assuming I decide to pursue this project further, I'll have to, obviously, do a lot more writing and a lot more polishing.

And I also need to make a map.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Qapla'!

It seems this post brings me up to one gross (ewww!) in total and with it, news of my successful completion of my first ever NaNoWriMo! One day early, even! Yay me!

Here's the breakdown of the "final" stats:
Words: 50 602
Paragraphs: 911
Characters: 281 012
Pages: 88
Chapters: 8

I put final in quotes because I might add one or two things tomorrow while it's still officially NaNoWriMo, but I am otherwise finished.

I'm probably going to take a day or two to decompress and then post some thoughts on the overall exerience.

Until then,

Freak Out
-TfitC

Fifty Percent Plus One

No, this post is not about referendums. Rather, it is an update on my NaNoWriMo progress, now on the 16th day, which is one day past the half-way mark.

So far, things continue apace. I am still on-track and currently sit at about 27 000 words (including what I've written so far today) spanning 48 pages, which is actually a little ahead of schedule. I'm still enjoying the process (though it is quite the commitment, forcing myself to write at least 1667 words each day!) and unexpected things keep happening in the story itself. So as long as things continue as they have been, I should have no trouble reaching the 50 000 word goal and may even hit it a day or two early.

The story itself won't be anywhere near finished at the end of the month as at the half-way point it feels like it's only just getting started. While I don't have a detailed outline or anything, I did do a very rough overview of the early parts of the story and I am nearly to the end of it, though so much has happened that is either different from how I had envisioned it or which I hadn't anticipated at all that I think the outline (such as it is) is kind of moot at this point anyway.

Overall I'm fairly happy with how the story seems to be progressing, though I don't think it's as humourous so far as I'd like it to be, though I am of course putting funny or silly things in where I can. At the moment, I'm just focused on pumping out my daily quota and don't really have the extra time to stop and make it as humourous as it could be. That's something I can go back and put in via editing, I guess! Because it's naturally going to need editing when all is said and done.

I think it also goes to show that humour is hard, especially continuous, consistently maintained humour (though there's also nothing saying that a basically humours story can't have its serious moments as well). It's one of the reasons why I admire Weird Al so much; having a 30-year plus long career based on being funny is no small feat and I often think he doesn't get the credit he deserves for it.

Anyway, that's enough ramblings for today. I'll do a wrap-up post at the end of the month (or early next month) to review my NaNoWriMo experience.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

One-Page Complete

The comics workshop continues apace. Since the last post on the subject, the one-page comic series of homework has been finished. This was done in two steps: penciling and then inking.

Above are the pencils for my version of the one-page comic. I penciled directly over the non-photo blue rough work and scanned it in using the greyscale setting on my scanner. As can be seen, the non-photo blue lines have disappeared, no further work required.

The next step was inking the art work, with my results shown above. Unlike the mini-comic that I did over the summer which I ended up inking largely with the brush, this was inked using a nib pen, which was the aspect of inking which the workshop covered last week (we'll be doing brushes later on). I used four different nibs for inking, one for each row of panels. In reality, I'd probably use different nibs for different parts of the drawing, but as I'm new to this, this was a way to try out some different nibs without having to worry too much about specifics. One thing of note, I forgot to draw in the pattern on the father's vest in the last panel - how I missed such a large detail, I don't know, but oh well.

The nibs themselves were interesting to work with - easier to control than a brush, but more flexible than a normal pen, plus they make an interesting scratching noise when drawing.

I should probably also note that I didn't erase the rough work before scanning, which is mostly visible in the word balloons and the lettering guidelines (created with an Ames lettering guide).

The next series of homework walks us through the creation of, in theory, a six page mini-comic. For the purposes of my workshop, I'm suggesting a two to six page mini-comic, depending on how ambitious each participant feels, or how much time they think they have. I'm still not sure how many pages I'm going to tackle, but I'm hoping to try for at least another four page one.

Well, we'll see how things go.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Ready, Set, Write!

This is going to be a picture-less post (gasp!)

I've decided to attempt NaNoWriMo this year (that's National Novel Writing Month for anyone who might not be familiar with the acronym). That means my free time for November will be taken up largely by comics and writing.

NaNoWriMo is something that I've been wanting to do for at least the past couple of years, but never felt I had the time due to one thing or another. While it's debatable whether or not I actually have enough time this year, I've decided that I don't really want to put it off yet another year. And while I could just pick a month and do my own personal NaNoWriMo, it just doesn't have the same degree of motivation.

And so, after about a week of writing, I am currently on track, up to about 11 700 total words. At this point, I'm fairly confident that I should have no problem meeting the 50 000 quota by the end of the month so long as I can continue setting aside sufficient time to write.

I'm enjoying the writing so far. This marks the first significant creative writing I've done in the past few years that is not FASS related. I have a basic premise in mind for the story and now more-or-less where I'm going, but there's no detailed outline. In a way, it's similar to how I was approaching the Kyoujo RPG. And so far, at about 20 pages in, several unexpected things have happened in the story - either things that I hadn't foreseen at the outset or things that have unfolded differently than I had original thought they might. But that's ok! I think that's part of the fun of writing.

The story itself is meant to be a humourous fantasy story which combines original elements with parody. The basic idea is one that's been rattling around at the back of my head for several years, since the year I spent working in Toronto, if I recall correctly.

Anyway! That's all I have to say about that at the moment. Still trying to decide if I want to post the actual story to this blog, or perhaps just some of the better snippets.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

I've Got the Non-Photo Blues

Cue jazz solo.

So. As I mentioned previously, the current homework series for the comic workshop I'm running is a one-page comic using a script supplied by the textbook (having everyone use the same script gives a chance to see how different people handle the issues in creating the comic and compare results). For this week, we were doing the penciling and lettering. I'm not quite done yet (I'll be finishing it up tonight since the workshop is tomorrow) but figured I'd post progress so far.

I drew the rough pencils using an erasable non-photo blue pencil. Non-photo blue means that it's not supposed to show up when copying / scanning. As you can see above, the drawings are very faint, except the places where I pressed harder (probably too hard) whilst sketching. It would probably only take a little tweaking on the scanner settings to eliminate it entirely so it's nice to know that the pencils function more-or-less as advertised.
Above is the version with inked lettering and panel borders. All that's left for this week is to do the final pencils with a regular pencil.

Freak Out
-TFitC

In the Dark

The comic workshop continue to plug along. This week, I've got two images to post, one in-class exercise and another being a homework assignment.

First, we were talking about lettering and word balloons this past week and the in-class exercise was to create a one-page comic with no pictures, so here's mine:Yeah, yeah, plutonium doesn't work that way - it's comic logic, after all.

For the homework, we're currently going through a series of assignments that has us making a one-page comic based on a short story provided by the textbook, starting with thumbnails, then penciling and finally inking. The process is not entirely unlike what I did for The Word Smith mini-comic, but I figure I'll document it here anyway. Below are my version of the thumbnails:
We were allowed to modify the dialogue to suit our sense of humour. While I didn't modify much dialogue per se, I added some, such as mention of spleens (because "spleen" is a funny word).

That's all for now. I guess I'll post the pencils when I get them finished.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Psst... Hey, buddy!

So, another week, another assignment for the comic workshop I'm running this term. This week's assignment was to draw a single-panel scene showing something happening using at least two figures interacting with objects in the foreground, midground and background. The main point is to practice penciling and try out drawing a detailed scene.

Below is my result:"Hey, buddy, wanna buy... a spatula?"

Not much to say beyond that, really.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Limited Edition Prints

I've noticed that the recent trend on this blog is for most entries to have pictures included - not necessarily a bad thing (at least, I don't think I've posted anything that would make someone want to gauge their eyes out). And with this post, that trend continues!

I'm taking a course this term (auditing, actually, which means I don't have to do a final project) on Computers and Aesthetics. As part of that, last week the class took a field trip and had a print making class. Basically, what this entails is applying paint to some suitable material (we used plexiglass) and then transferring it to a dampened paper using a fancy press machine thing. This process means you actually need to paint the mirror image of what you want the final print to look like, which is obviously important for text.

I had time to make three prints, the first two in watercolour, the third using oil-based paints.

Here's the first print:
This is one of my FR characters. I forgot to write the text and the symbol up at the top as a mirror image so it ended up backwards (oops). For the curious, the text is her name and is written in Tolkien's tengwar system. It is supposed to read "Gillin" but, as mentioned, it ended up backwards.

The second print (also watercolour) was of one of the characters from my mini-comic project over the summer:I remembered to draw the text the correct way for this one, but I still ended up having to make fixes to the symbol, which is why it looks a bit smudged.

The final print was done using oils:The first "S" ended up backwards... but, oh well.

Anyway, that is that, I suppose. It was a fun class, but at the end of the day, I prefer drawing.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Let's Strip! Comics, That Is

This week's assignment for the comic workshop was, essentially, a comic strip. Here is my result:


Freak Out,
-TFitC

Not A Toilet

"Well, at least he's stopped trying to drink out of the toilet."

The above was my most recent "homework" assignment for the comics workshop I'm running (and participating in) this term. We were talking about single-panel comics and the assignment was, basically, to draw one, with the above being my result.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Lets Get Digital (digital)

I set aside some time over the weekend to finish the digital version of page 3 of the mini-comic, shown below on the left to show off my photoshop n00bness in all its glory. For comparison, the hand drawn version is on the right. One thing to point out is that readers will notice that a couple of panels in the digital version are missing backgrounds. That's because I decided to add in those backgrounds after I'd scanned in the original pencils. The background for the panel in the lower left corner was also added after scanning originally, but I decided to draw it in the digital version in photoshop since it counterbalances the panel in the upper right.

Left: digitally inked version of page 3; Right: hand inked version. (Gah... you'll probably have to click on the right hand image to see all of it 'cause blogger's too narrow. Oh well. Also grr... I just noticed I forgot to colour in the Word Smith's mask in one panel of the digital version. Oh well. Not going to worry about it now!)

I also ended up leaving the pencils in the digital version since I decided I was too lazy to remove them (plus I screwed up a bit and drew some stuff on the background layer so I couldn't just go and delete it... oops) so you can see some of the pencil drawings underneath.

This now officially concludes the mini-comic project, though I seem to be having some bad thoughts... I've had various random ideas related to continuing the project (such as the Word Smith's origin story) so I might actually do some more with it. We'll see, I guess...

Freak Out,
-TFitC

It's A Puzzle!

Here's a little puzzle (sorry for the crappy drawing). Feel free to leave guesses in the comments. Yar.
Freak Out,
-TFitC

Earthquake!!

I knew I felt some odd rumbling in the lab earlier this afternoon. Turns out I was right.

And just so this isn't just a one-liner, here's a screen shot of my current research-in-progress:

It's the most recent version of my panel layout algorithm. Things are progressing fairly smoothly, at least when I'm not procrastinating or whatever.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Just An Ordinary Day...

Went to the beach today and was inspired to draw this very quick, very rough comic when I got home:
Enjoy!

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Mini-Comic Post-Mortem

Brief note: this is a long, slightly rambling post reflecting my recent mini-comic experiment. Hopefully it will be at least slightly interesting and, perhaps, even illuminating, but I make to promises. Also, this is post number 128, or two to the power of seven.

-----

Now that it's been several days since I've completed my mini-comic project, it's time for what the game industry (and possibly others) generally refer to as a "post-mortem". (Funny that the game industry would use a term that can also refer to an autopsy. I wonder if there's any symbolism there, or if it's just a coincidence?)

Anyway... This project was not my first attempt to make a comic. Several years ago, I drew a couple of pages based on a story my sister had written. That little experiment was only ever intended as a gift and was never really meant to go farther than that (though I briefly considered it). My approach for it was different that for my mini-comic. Back then, I really had no idea what I was doing - I drew each panel separately, on individual pages, scanned them, and attempted to assemble them into full pages in Corel PhotoPaint. It sort of worked, but by drawing each panel in isolation, they didn't fit together as well as they could have. I don't recall if I did anything analogous to thumbnailing, though I think I at least had a vague notion of how things were going to fit together. Still, doing the layout properly would have saved a few headaches.

It doesn't have to make sense. Notice the slightly odd panel arrangement in the upper right corner - a consequence of drawing each panel individually without the context of the larger layout.

Since then (and in the context of my PhD over the past couple of years) I've read several books on the subject of making comics and have learned a lot more about the subject in the process. Thus, I now know the importance of doing thumbnails and properly designing the layout before I start. I've also learned about various techniques that are used in comic and, to an extent, why. For my mini-comic I attempted to follow what seems to be the standard practice and I think that helped out.

That said, I was still a bit "looser" with my process than maybe I should have been. My script was, initially, more of an outline, which left several sections of dialogue along the lines of "gives cheesey speech" or the likes. As a result, I ended up rewriting (or in some cases writing) dialogue as I went along, though the script was finalized before the comic itself was finished (before page two was finished, at least, I think). While there is something to be said for being a bit flexible with the script (I found myself rewriting dialogue for page 1, which was one of the more finished pages in the script at that point, while I was drawing the page) it's still important to, at least, have a complete, fully written draft of the script since it's also quite important to be able to plan the placement of word balloons.

Moving on the the drawing side, well, I am not an artist! While I have done a fair bit of sketching in the past, it's mostly been of individual characters in relatively neutral poses. I do not have much experience drawing scenery, or characters interacting with each other, let alone whilst doing actiony things. I bought myself a mirror that I could use to help with poses and anatomy and such, though I've still got lots of work to do there. Though I wonder if it might be better for me to focus on a more cartoonish style (moreso than I'm doing now) where having less realistic proportions wouldn't be so much of an issue.

The thumbnails that I drew for the mini-comic could also, I think, have been a bit more detailed. There does seem to be a fairly wide variance in the level of detail that artists put into their thumbnails. While I didn't want to get bogged down with putting too many details into my thumbnails, I think there were a couple of cases where I could have benefited if they'd been a bit more detailed. In one case, I had to slightly modify my panel layout to accommodate changes in panel composition (bottom row of page 1) and in the second, I actually changed the composition of a group of panels from what was in the thumbnails (top right corner of page 2). Though in the second case, that was partly due to the script still being in a slightly unfinished state at that point.

Despite some of the criticisms above, I'm generally pleased with how the mini-comic turned out, my own artistic limitations aside. It's also kind of nice to have the physical artifacts left over as a result (ie, the physical comic pages).

Final Thoughts

Overall, I had fun with the project. I enjoy drawing, which I hadn't done nearly enough of in recent years. I feel like I learned a lot, which is good as that was part of the goal. I also find myself wanting to do more - not necessarily continuing the mini-comic (despite leaving the door open for more at the end of page 4, I basically intended it to be a one-off), but I'd like to do a longer term comic project of some sort. Though whatever that project ends up being, I've also got to get faster at drawing pages, or maybe just devote more time to it.

Before that, however, my next comic related project will be, if all goes according to plan, running an (unofficial) reading group on making comics in the graphics lab using the book "Drawing Word and Writing Pictures", presuming that there's sufficient interest and timing works and all that.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

The Epic Conclusion!

Here, at last, is the fourth and final page of my mini-comic project:

Won't say too much more beyond that, as the process was the same as the previous two pages. With this page, the project is now complete - a rare finished project for me! I guess I still need to do the digital version for page 3 (and maybe page 4 as well), but that's a side thing. I'll probably do a follow-up post in the near future to sum up my thoughts on the whole project, but for now I'll just say - it was fun!

Freak Out,
-TFitC

P.S.

The mini-comic is also available, sequentially, at this location.

Three Down, One to Go!

Well, almost a month (yikes!) after page two, here is page three of the mini-comic!

Everything was done by hand, same as for page two. I'm also working on a digitally inked version of page three, but in the interest of getting the entire mini-comic complete before the end of the summer I'm going to be focusing on finishing the fourth and final page before spending much time on the digital version of page three, but it'll be posted for comparison whenever its finished.

Now, if I ever want to do a longer-term project than this, I've got to get faster than a measly one page a month!

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Page Two

Page two of the mini-comic is complete! There's not really much to say about this one. The main difference between page two and page one is that I did every thing for page two by hand, including lettering - and I apologize for making everyone read my hand writing. I also inked a larger percentage of the page with the brush this time, but otherwise my process was pretty much the same as for page one. Some things didn't turn out like I'd hoped, but, well, I guess that's part of the learning experience. Anyway! This means I'll be starting page three in the near future - guess I'm about half way done!

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Some Random Blather

In an effort to get past some writer's block today, I spewed out the following:

Run to the border, because if you don't run, you'll have to walk, and if you have to walk, you'll wear the soles off the bottom of your shoes, and if that happens, you'll have to get new shoes. Or perhaps you'll wear off the bottom of your feet until you're reduced to walking on the stubs of your ankles and that would just be all sorts of awkward, not to mention likely causing balance issues. So, it's up to you, really. Will you run, or will you end up waddling along on the bloody stumps of your ankles, all because you were too lazy to go out and buy some new shoes? I know, I know, it doesn't seem fair - after all, why should you be forced to go out and buy new shoes if you're happy with the ones you have now? And why not sandals? Or slippers? Or maybe you feel like being all glamourous and wearing some high heels, even though that would mean you're cross dressing. Or at least your feet would be, even if the rest of you wouldn't be. But if you're going to do that, why not go all the way? I mean, what's stopping you? Oh, sure, society might still not entirely approve of that sort of thing, but who am I to judge? And lets be honest here, it's just not the sort of thing you can half-ass, nope, it's either all the way in, or not at all. Which brings us back to those shoes - don't you think they're looking a little ratty? Which isn't to say you have rats in them, or that you wear rats on your feet (goodness no, now that would be more than a little weird, wouldn't it?) but that they're - how can I put this kindly... well, I can't, really, they look like crap. Your shoes really do look like crap. Now, normally I wouldn't point this out, I don't habitually go around telling people their shoes are crap, after all (that would be weird too, not to mention a little neurotic), but when I see an eyesore like that, well, I just can't help pointing it out. I might laugh, too, but now, that would just be mean. So you come in here, wearing shoes that look like all it would take to make them disintegrate would be nothing more than a good sneeze and I have just one question to ask: would you like to super size your tacos? Because we can totally do that. You could even wear them on your feet, you know, if you wanted to.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Character Design Part 4

This is the last part of the character design for my mini-comic: one of the waitresses at the Street Meet Cafe (rough sketch below).

I actually ended up putting the character into the first panel of page 1 which was not originally planned so I did the quick rough sketch while in the process of drawing that panel. The more detailed design was not done until more recently. For the purposes of this project, the character is a minor one, but there's an off chance she'll become more important should I decide to continue this project (most certainly not a guarantee or anything) so I did a bit more of a detailed design than my other minor characters.

The "action" pose was meant to be some sort of discus throw type thing, but didn't really turn out how I wanted. That's a problem - I'm not really particularly good at doing action-y poses, but I suppose one of the points of this project is to get some practice at things like this. The above version is actually the second attempt - I erased the original pose and redrew it. The second one turned out better, even if it still wasn't really what I was trying for.

I also ended up doing another quick sketch with another variant on the pose. I think I like this one better (for the most part), even if it still needs work!

Lastly, I also did a quick sketch on an alternate design of The Word Smith's mask (it's actually loosely based on the logo for the Final Fantasy Distant Worlds concerts):

And that's it for character design! Since I don't expect that the process for the remaining pages will be much different from the first page, I'm not likely going to do any in-progress posts like I did for page one and will just post the remaining pages as I finish them. Not having a deadline like I did for the first page, the other pages might take a while, but we'll see!

Freak Out,
-TFitC

Final Fantasy 12 Replay

I had not originally intended to do one of these summary things for Final Fantasy 12 since it was released after I had started my Final Fantasy series replay project. However, after replaying Tactics, I figured "why not?", plus I like the game so it seemed like a good excuse to replay it.

Final Fantasy 12 seems to be one of the more love it or hate it games in the series - not much middle ground - though that could maybe be said for some of the more recent entries in the series (and probably some older ones as well). As already stated, I rather like the game, and if I were to rank the entries in the series, FF12 would probably be somewhere near the top.

That's not to say that the game doesn't have its flaws. There are certainly some boneheaded design decisions (Zodiac Spear I'm looking at you!) and one could probably make the argument that some areas are a little too big - and this coming from someone who likes big areas! Still, overall, I enjoyed the game despite its flaws.

Even though I've already said that some areas were probably a little too big, one of the things that I did like about FF12 was that it has large areas to explore which, for the most part, the player is relatively free to wander around in. Also, while the plot is still a linear affair, aside from a few sections, the player is relatively free to go off and do side-quest things (which are mostly the hunts in FF12) pretty much any time (not just at/near the end of the game), provided they're high enough to handle the monsters they come across, which is something that seems to have been missing from some of the more recent games in the series.

The setting and plot are also somewhat different from other FFs. The game is set in the world of Ivalice, which is the setting of the FF Tactics games. While the connection between FF12's Ivalice and FF Tactics' Ivalice is not made clear within the game, some investigation on the weeb suggests that FF12 is set several hundred years before Tactics, though I don't know how canonical that is.

The plot, like that of Tactics, also has more of a focus on political intrigue and things of that nature. There are of course magic and things happening in the background, but it's the political struggles that give people their motivations and forms more of the core of the story. And I liked that.

The game's music is also quite obviously from the Tactics composer. There are a number of pieces that have a similar style or feel to them, and many places where the ornamentation also evokes that Tactics-ish feel to it.

For this playthrough, I took some time to do a bunch of the hunts that I didn't do the first time and also to hunt down a few more of the optional Espers. (Which, incidentally, where based on the Zodiac beasts from Tactics, the Totemas from Tactics Advanced and a few bosses from past games rather than the traditional FF summons which were instead used as airship names.) I didn't do all of the hunts (not insane enough to go after Yiazmat, for example) but I ended up doing most of them. I generally enjoyed most of the hunt and boss fights.

Anyway, that's my thoughts on FF12 in a nutshell. With that replay finished, I suppose I will at some point in the near future look into getting a PS3 so I can play FF13. Whether or not I'll do a write-up for it remains to be seen.

Freak Out,
-TFitC

A Not So Short Summary of Final Fantasy 12

Final Fantasy 12
============

- Welcome to the Royal City of Rabanastre, heart of the Kingdom of Dalmasca. Today is Princess Ashe's wedding day and an elaborate parade is being held in her honour with Moogles and everything! Ashe and her groom - prince what's-his-name, Humperdink? no, it starts with R or something, well, he's really not important in the grand scheme of things - are paraded through the streets before they tie the knot.

- Shortly after (presumably) King Raminas is in a war council with his generals where he receives word that the fortress of Nabudis has fallen to the advancing Arcadian Empire and sends troops to reinfoce Nalbina fortress on Dalmasca's borders.

- Reinforcements are led by some knight-guy, and Ashe's princeling decides to tag along as well. Something about avenging his father or some such.

- Nalbina comes under attack in a battle that's something like a cross between Star Wars and The Lord of the Rings: airships fighting each other in the sky whilst everyone one on the ground bludgeons each other with swords. How quaint.

- Anyway, Dalmasca's forces are totally outmatched by Arcadia. Kight-guy tries to retreat, but the princeling decides to halucinate that he's Aragorn or something and tries taking on the Arcadian forces single handedly only to get shot by a lone bowman.

- Just then, an airship crashes into the ground giving knight-guy a chance to escape with princeling's corpse which he brings back to Rabanastre.

- Then, a narration by Marquis Ondore fills us in on some relevant political details: two empires, Arcadia in the east and Rozzaria in the west are currently vieing for control of Ivalice with Dalmasca caught in the middle. The invasion of Dalmasca is Arcadia's first move in its westward expansion.

- Dalmasca tries to launch a counter attack against Arcadia, but is utterly defeated and forced to accept unconditional surrender. The King travels to Nalbina to sign the treaty but some of Dalmasca's knight-types catch wind that an assassination is in the air.

- Knight-guy, who is now known as Captain Basch fon Ronsenburg, arrives at Nalbina and finds Reks, a young, wounded soldier. He sends Vossler, another of his knights, on into the fortress while he teaches Reks the ropes in a tutorial level.

- Basch, Reks and a few nameless knights easily plow through Arcadia's troops (must be the second string on guard duty or something) and just before arriving in the main hall, Reks tells Basch to go on ahead while he mops up a few more of the flies.

- Reks then quickly heads to rejoin Basch but finds an aweful sight in the main hall: everyone's dead (except for me)! Including the King. Basch then swiftly appears behind Reks and stabs him.

- Some Arcadian soldiers run in as Basch loudly proclaims this was all his doing and the King was a traitor. Some Arcadian pretty boy enters and says this shows that Arcadia should take over Dalmasca completely.

- Just before Reks dies, he whispers one last thing: Vaan, the name of his younger brother.

- Marquis Ondore then narrates that Basch was executed and that Ashe, having lost both her husband and her kingdom has committed suicide. He further advises the people of Dalmasca to roll over and take it, presumably some sort of peaceful resistance or something. Guess he's having delusions of Ghandi.

- Two years later, Vaan is hunting rats in a sewer (typical RPG hero stuff, that), egged on by the youngster Kytes.

- When he is finished mercilessly slaughtering defenceless rodents, Vaan and Kytes leave the sewers, Kytes going to one Migelo for work and Vaan leaving to pursue his own line of work as a thief. (At least he doesn't insist on being called a "Treasure Hunter" like certain other thieves, though Vaan probably doesn't have much of an education...)

- Vaan bumps into a couple of Arcadian soldiers who are making asses of themselves and make off with their money pouch. He escapes into the crowd and runs into Penelo, another orphan like him. She doesn't approve of his line of work but that doesn't stop her from helping herself to a couple of his ill-gotten coins.

- In a brief moment of respite, an airship passes overhead and Vaan proclaims he will, some day, be a Sky Pirate. Yeah, you tell us how that ends up working out for you, kid. Anyway, the moment passes and Penelo goes off to do some work for Migelo and suggests Vaan do the same. Man, she's kind of bossy.

- With nothing better to do, Vaan heads to Migelo's, a Bangaa (a lizard-like humanoid) shop keeper. Migelo sends Vaan to look for Kytes at the Sand Sea Tavern. Kytes was supposed to be running errands for him but hasn't returned.

- At the Sand Sea, Vaan finds Kytes oogling some wanted poster. It's for a mean beastie that's been roaming the desert, harassing the couriers who have supposed to be bringing in goods (Kytes was supposed to find a replacement courier or somesuch).

- The tavern keeper then wanders over and teaches Vaan about marks and hunts and some other game mechanics that are worth knowing about then sends him off to hunt the mark on the poster (the dreaded Rogue Tomato) and gives him some papers that will get him safely out of the city. (The city's in lock down mode right now since a new consul is coming later today and the Arcadians don't want anything unexpected to happen.)

- So, Vaan heads to the east gate of Rabanastre and out into the Dalmasca Estersands - it's Tomato hunting time! (Careful, it's deadly to comedians.) The thing is just a short distance out of town and goes down without much trouble.

- Heading back, Vaan runs into trouble at the gate as it's been closed until after the parade. Just then, some purebred Chocobos are brought in and Vaan exchanges "words" with the guards. Things look to turn ugly until Migelo and Penelo show up (having come looking for Vaan) and Migelo bribes the guards with some wine, then they all scurry inside.

- The new consul's parade and installation ceremony begin. Turns out the new consul is some Arcadian pretty boy named Vayne Solidor who's the guy who mopped up the situation with Basch and the King at Nalbina. He's also the Emperor's son but apparently emperor is an elected position.

- Vayne gives a speech where he says some words, babbling about honouring King Raminas by pursuing peace. The crowd seems to eat it up, or maybe they've just been lulled into a stupour. Vaan, however, is not amused.

- As Migelo is basically the provisioner for the Imperials' banquet tonight, he scurries off to see to things. Vaan, not being one to be left out, decides he wants to play Robin Hood and gate crash the party so he heads to Lowtown to speak to Old Man Dalan to find out how to sneak into the palace.

- It turns out that the old man is remarkably well informed and knows of a secret passage into the palace, but it needs a special magicked stone which the old man also just happens to have, except that it needs to be recharged with a sunstone.

- The old man, however, does not actually have a sunstone so he sends Vaan to the Nomad People in the Giza Plain, south of the city, who do know of such things.

- The nomads make sunstones as part of their livelihood and they know a sucker when they see one so they send Vaan out to make some for them. Before heading out, Vaan bumps into Penelo who's here on a lark, basically, since she's got the day off whilst Migelo slaves away for the Imperials. She tags along after Vaan since she suspects he's up to no good - which is, of course, exactly the case.

- Vaan manages to make a sunstone without incident and the villagers decide to let him keep one for himself. Time to head back to Rabanastre and proceed to get up to no good.

- Back at the city, Penelo runs off to mind the shop and Vaan heads back to Old Dalan who happily infuses the magic thingambob that Vaan needs with power from the sunstone. Dalan then fills the young ne'er-do-well in on how to sneak into the palace.

- The Gamarsythe Waterway connects into the basement of the Palace, so basically Vaan gets to go swimming in the sewers. In a little "meanwhile" sequence, we see some suspicious characters who appear to have the same idea as Vaan, including a strangely familiar soldier (looks like that Vossler fellow from the tutorial - looks like he's been wearing the same clothes for two years) and a woman of some sort.

- Anyway, Vaan swims in raw sewage, eventually emerging in the servants' area of the Royal Palace. Fortunately for Vaan, the servants weren't hired for their smarts and they think he's just one of the temp workers to help out with tonight's party.

- Oh, just as Vaan is sneaking into the servants' area, another meanwhile shows a bunny-girl and some guy in a poofy shirt ride into the palace grounds on some sort of flashy hover bike. Seems like the party is attracting all sorts of gate crashers.

- Back to business, the servants are being sequestered downstairs until the party is over (they're the clean-up crew) though with the help of one servant, Vaan is able to sneak past the guards (apparently, the guards weren't hired for their smarts either).

- Upstairs, Vaan sneaks around the not-so-bright guards until he finds the entrance to the treasure room with the help of the magic rock Dalan gave him.

- Inside the treasury, Vaan manages to find another glowing magic rock hidden inside a goddess statue. This is when bunny-girl and her escort (who calls himself the leading man - go figure) show up and try steal from Vaan what Vaan has already stolen. They also call the rock "magicite", so Final Fantasy fans will know this isn't just your run-of-the-mill magic rock.

- Vaan decides he doesn't like these two that much and runs away, but just then there's a commotion outside in the gardens as a full scale pitched battle is raging - these are the real gate crashers, it seems.

- The airship "Ifrit" shows up and starts blasting things and Mr. Leading Man thinks it a little suspect that it showed up so fast. He and bunny-girl decide to make their getaway and, since Vaan still isn't parting with the magicite, they decide to go ahead and steal Vaan instead (kind of like a two-for-one deal, I guess).

- The duo's hoverbike, however, suffers a catastrophic failure and crash lands back into the sewers. The two finally introduce themselves as Balthier (Mr. Leading Man) and Fran (bunny-girl, who also seems to be the mechanic), a pair of Sky Pirates and they make it clear to Vaan that if he wants to get out of this with his skin intact, he'll do as they say. He still acts like a stubborn little kid and refuses to turn over the magicite, however.

- There are some dead rebels nearby and Balthier speculates they had planned on taking advantage of lower security during the party to attack the Palace, except that Vayne seems to have anticipated that and set a trap using the airforce.

- Back to swimming in raw sewage. Vaan and crew come upon a woman who's being attacked by imperial soldiers so Vaan, ever reckless, jumps in to the rescue. She introduces herself as Amalia, a member of the resistance, and joins as a guest.

- A little later, the party is ambushed by some flans, kind of a boss battle, but not quite.

- A little later still, just as they're about to leave the sewers, the party encounters their first real boss battle - a flaming horse? In this watery place? I guess it's various sewer gasses that have ignited and attained sentience or are possessed by something or other. It's actually a kind of tough-ish fight, but fortunately the party seems to have some sort of perma-reraise and Amalia comes with seemingly unlimited potions so it's more of a training battle before the game takes the gloves off.

- The sewer gas is vanquished and the party is all puffed up with their own brilliance just when the imperials (including Vayne) show up and haul everyone off to the dungeons (though they are kindly paraded through the streets infront of the jeering crowds and a distraught Penelo first). Also, a Bangaa bounty hunter seems upset that the Imperials got Balthier before he could.

- Vaan halucinates about his brother Reks who is slumped in a chair in a sterile room and then evaporates before waking up in the Nalbina Dungeons (I take this to be all in Vaan's head, proof that he's got issues, rather than implying that Reks is actually alive somewhere - I don't think we ever see Reks again).

- It seems that the Arcadians are actually not entirely stupid since they've gone and confiscated all our equipment rather than leave us armed like some villains. Balthier is rather cavalier about the whole situation whilst Fran is nosing around for a way out and Amalia is totally AWOL.

- Vaan seem incapable of sitting still and goes off to poke around. This gains the attention of an ill-tempered Seeq (pig-like thing) and his goons, forcing Balthier to come to Vaan's rescue. There's a short bout of fisticuffs and it's a good thing the goons aren't used to roughing up people with access to cure spells.

- Just then, some imperial soldiers enter, accompanied by a Judge, one of the elite guard of House Solidor (current ruling family) and those anti-Balthier bounty Bangaa. The Judge is off to interogate someone and the Bangaa are looking for Balthier (of course)

- Fran also chooses this moment to reappear - her bunny senses are tingling. Seems she senses a way out through the Obliette, though it's apparently misty down there - who's scared of a little mist? Anyway, a way out is a way out and our heroes seem to know when they've worn out their welcome.

- The party follows the Judge into the next section of the dungeons. Balthier seems to imply that we should try sneaking around all the guards, but there's no penalty for fighting them and that's much easier anyway. Who needs brains? Vaan SMASH!

- The Judge arrives at the oubliette where a prisoner is kept in solitary confinement. It's our old friend Captain Basch. He's been here for around two years so either the Empire has forgotten about him until now or this is just part of the regular routine.

- The Judge mentions they've captured Amalia, but Basch is playing dumb. The Judge then mocks Basch's loyalty to a defeated kingdom and leaves him hanging - quite literally.

- Balthier and crew then have a moment to ponder things. Vaan goes a little berserk, what with Basch being a traitor and all that and the whole thing with his brother getting killed under his commmand and all that.

- For the sake of expedience, the party uses Basch's cage as an impromptu elevator down to the bottom of the whole that it was dangling over. The crash landing breaks the cage open and everybody seems no worse for the wear.

- Balthier takes a more pragmatic view of Basch than Vaan does, seeing as the whole point at the moment is to get out of here alive. The party then starts to make their way through Barheim Passage, seemingly some sort of old, abandoned mining tunnels.

- On the way, Basch tries to convince the party that he didn't kill the King - it was really his evil twin brother. (Riiiight. Well, I suppose Basch has been caged up by himself for a while and probably tortured, so it's only natural his sanity's taken a bit of a hit.)

- The boss in this area is a nest of mimics (including their Queen), and after beating them the party emerges into the Estersands as the tunnel entrance collapses behind them.

- Basch decides to return to Dalmasca despite the fact that most of the city probably still hates him as a traitor (this may not go down in history as the Best Idea Evar) and Vaan wants to make sure Penelo's not too worried about him (awwww...)

- Arriving back in the city, everyone parts ways leaving Vaan to wander over to Migelo's in search of Penelo. He also wants to gloat about that magicite shard he found (which he's still not giving to Fran and Balthier)

- But the raspy-voiced Bangaa is not there, instead Kytes informs Vaan that everyone is busy elsewhere (where he doesn't know) and that he was supposed to go bug Old Dalan about something but is too busy with work. Vaan, always looking for a way to avoid doing real work, goes to see Dalan in Kytes' place.

- Old Dalan is still, well, old, and he decides Vaan's a much better errand boy than Kytes. So he gives Vaan a sword of the "Old Order" to deliver to some guy names Azelas in a house nearby. I guess Dalan is decrepit as well as old.

- Vaan dutifully takes the sword and does as he is told. Except at the place in question, Basch is trying to rally members of the resistance. They are understandably wary after their previous attempt failed and they are not too quick to believe Basch's wild story of an evil twin. There are also some rumblings against Marquis Ondore who is viewed as collaborating with the Empire.

- Basch storms off with Vaan in tow, the sword delivery errand conveniently forgotten. (No Azelas was mentioned, though it is not impossible that Dalan is also a touch senile.) Vaan also seems to have gotten past some of his earlier dislike of Basch.

- Basch currently has a mind to pay Marquis Ondore a visit (for reasons he does not yet reveal). It seems the Marquis lives in some sort of floating city so we head off to enlist the local Sky Pirates. (Hmm... evil Empire, floating city with an apparently Empire-friendly ruler, where have I seen that before? I sense a trap.)

- Balthier and Fran are kicking back at the Sandsea tavern where Migelo is giving them an earful. Seems Penelo has been kidnapped by those Banga bounty hunters (Ba'gammon, or backgammon or something) thinking she has some connection to Balthier (probably due to when she was watching them being dragged off to the dungeons).

- Balthier claims its not his problem, but he is cajoled into helping by Vaan and Migelo. Basch tags along with the group because Penelo just happens to have been taken to the Lhusu Mines in Bhujerba, which is that floating city thing.

- Anyway, we take off! Though one has to wonder if Balthier is such a notorious Sky Pirate, wouldn't the Empire apprehend him as soon as he landed at any sort of well known city? Anywho, the whole thing has Vaan excited like a little kid at Christmas, even though they probably don't celebrate Christmas in Ivalice. Still...

- Balthier's airhsip, The Strahl, lands in Bhujerba without incident and everyone disembarks. Balthier impresses on everyone the importance of not using real names, seeing as we've just busted out of prison and are accompanied by a supposed traitor who is supposed to be dead (seems Ondore's the one who's responsible for that little rumour).

- No sooner does the party leave the aerodrome than they're set upon by some kid by the name of Lamont who overhears us talking about going to the mines and decides he wants to tag along. And of course Vaan goes and uses Basch's real name without a second thought. Smooth there.

- Anyway, there's an Imperial inspection of the mines underway and a Judge and Marquis Ondore and other minor officials exit just after we enter. Lamont also comes with an infinite supply of hi-potions so he's not too bad to have around.

- Some way into the mine we come upon a deposit that Lamont wanted to check out. He uses something he calls Nethicite, a sort of magic absorbing crystal. He seems to be investigating something to do with the Draklor laboratories. The name means something to Balthier but just what he doesn't say.

- Shortly thereafter we find the Bangaa bounty hunters who kidnapped Penelo (or they find us), but they've already cut her loose since they don't need her any more. Ba'Gammon pulls out a big circular saw thingy and the party decides to RUN AWAY!

- We manage to lose the bounty hunters and return to the entrance to the mines. The Imperials have apprehended Penelo as she wandered out of the mines, thinking her to be a trespasser. Lamont is also revealed to really be Larsa, one of Vayne's younger brothers, and he whisks Penelo off to relative safety (at least preventing her from being tossed into prison).

- Now Vaan and crew are left hanging. Basch still wants to see the Marquis and presumably Vaan still wants to rescue Penelo (honestly, more trouble than it's worth)

- It is believed that Ondore is secretly funnelling money/etc. to the Dalmascan resistance whilst at the same time playing nice with the Empire (hmmm, Lando Calrissian anyone?) so it is decided to try to make a scene to force the Marquis to pay attention to us. How? By having Vaan proclaim he is Captain Basch von Ronsenberg since Ondore is going around and saying the good captain is actually dead. Wouldn't going in guns blazing be faster and easier?

- Ok, so once Vaan is done making an ass of himself, some shadey looking types come and escort him to the back of the local tavern. Things aren't going well until the real Basch walks in, then everyone is rather amicable. They agree to arrange an audience with the Marquis at nightfall.

- Meeting the Marquis, Basch tells him that that he wants to rescue Amalia, but the Marquis declines to help. He's got his position to think about, you know? Basch draws his sword and the guards are summoned. Stay away from the carbonite, Basch!

- Also, Larsa's detachment has already left, with Penelo on board, so Vaan is being strung along some more.

- Meanwhile, back at Rabanastre, Vayne is talking to Judge Gabranth about the meddlesome Marquis. Gabranth believes the Marquis to be funding the insurgents, but a message has just arrived stating the Marquis has recaptured the runaway (presumably Basch) and Gabranth says he'll kill the escapee himself.

- Then Dr. Cid enters to have a little chat with Vayne about something or other. He comes in muttering to himself which is probably an indicator of some sort of mad genious or something.

- Anyway, Vaan and crew are now on the Dreadnought Leviathan and are being brought before Darth Ghis - I mean, Judge Ghis. Also present is Amalia who is now revealed to be Princess Leia, or rather, Princess Ashe, another of the living dead. The princess is not pleased to see Basch.

- Ghis is skeptical that Ashe is who she says she is, but Basch says a mystical knickknack called the Dusk Shard can prove her identity. And, surprise, surprise, the piece of magicite which Vaan has been doggedly holding on to is the Dusk Shard.

- Despite having refused to give it to Balthier multiple times, Vaan now hands it over to Ghis in an attempt to bargain with him so that everyone gets out with their lives in tact, but we all know it's really due to Ghis' force powers.

- Handing over the Shard doesn't prevent Ghis from sending everyone to be locked up, with Ashe in solitary confinement. However, while being dragged off, Basch and Balthier manage to overthrow their guards. This is helped when one of the guards turns out to be Vossler who had been planted there by Marquis Ondore, apparently. Oh, and the guards failed to disarm us.

- Now we run amok through the bowels of the ship to rescue Ashe, who we find eventually, and release from her cell. It should be noted that the game suggested sneaking around the soldiers to be a valid tactic, but its far easier (and results in better loot and experience) to just attack everything in sight. (Though why this doesn't attract the attention of the ship's commanders, I don't know.)

- It seems that *after* rescuing Ashe, we trip the alarm and Vossler gives up any pretense of sneaking around and decides we should just fight our way to the exit.

- On the way, we come across Larsa and Penelo. Even with the entire ship's guards on our tails, Vaan stops to have a touching reunion (priorities people!) Larsa seems to be intrigued that both Basche and Ashe are mysteriously not dead like they were supposed to be and lets us go so we can figure out why (lazy git letting us do all the dirty work...) He also gives Penelo his chunk of nethecite for luck.

- Incidentally, it turns out that Vossler is this mysterious Azelas that Dalan was talking about earlier, so I guess the old man isn't entirely senile.

- Vossler takes this opportunity to split and go find a shuttle of some sort. Conveniently, Judge Ghis then tries us to get in our way but we stab him until he falls down. Only then does Vossler reappear (yes, he's lazy too) to say he found an Atomos class ship which we fly back to Bhujerba.

- Dissembarking, Vossler suggests we go talk to Marquis Ondore to determine his true intentions.

- Confronting the Marquis, it's revealed that Vossler spirited Ashe away when her father was killed and Vayne had Ondore declare Ashe had committed suicide to make it appear Ondore was siding with the Empire.

- Ashe now wants Ondore to help her free Dalmasca but the Marquis points out that since the Empire has absconded with the Dusk Shard she no longer has proof of her heritage and advises her to wait until the time is right.

- But Ashe doesn't feel like waiting (does she look like a waiter?) and cooks up a plan to go Tomb Raiding and steal the Dawn Shard from King Raithwall's tomb (one of her ancestors - apparently royal lineage proving baubbles are a dime a dozen). She was going to abscond with Balthier's ship on her own, only Vaan catches her in the act and everyone else shows up to tag along for the ride. It's a merry ship of fools.

- Meanwhile, in Archades, Judge Gabranth reports to the Emperor who asks him to watch over and protect Larsa, since he doesn't want his sons warring again as has happened in the past (with other, older sons, it seems).

- We fly to the far edge of the Dalmasca Westersands where Balthier leaves the ship (he's got a handy cloaking device - everyone remember where we parked!) To get to the tomb, we now have to cross the Ogir-Yensa Sandsea, which is filled with Jagd, some mystical substance that prevents skysontes, or whatever they are that powers airships, from functioning so we have to walk.

- The Ogir-Yensa Sandsea contains a sprawling, interlinked series of oil platforms, originally constructed by the Rozzarian Empire to the west, now abandoned. The sandsea is also no home to Jawas... er, the Urutan-Yensa, an unfriendly though diminutive race.

- Before going far, Vossler catches up to us to help escort Ashe. He knows how to hit things with a large sword so he's kind of handy to have around.

- After a long trek to the west, we finally arrive at King Raithwall's Tomb. Ashe then proceeds to give us a bit of a history lesson.

- Raithwall was called the Dynast-King and ruled over a large area. As he was of the wise and benevolent type, there was an era of peace and prosperity and this allowed the fledgling states of Arcadia and Rozzaria to flourish.

- Raithwall left behind three magicite shards. The midlight shard went to Landis, now part of the Arcadian Empire. The Dusk Shard went to what became House Nabudis and I guess ended up in Dalmasca after Ashe married Rossler who was prince of Nabudis.

- The final shard, the Dawn Shard, was left hidden in the Tomb and is known only to those of royal lineage and that's what we're here to steal. Time to go Tomb Raiding!

- It turns out the Dawn Shard is guarded by an Esper - Belias, the Gigas. Legend has it, that King Raithwall defeated a Gigas and bound it to his service and this is it. After defeating it, it works for us.

- The Dawn Shard has hallucinogenic properties, causing Ashe to see her dead husband. Be that as it may, our team absconds with it though no sooner do we leave than Archadia's 8th fleet shows up. But how did they fly through the Jagd? Is their airship technology unaffected? Or maybe the truth is just that Balthier's ship sucks. Who knows?

- Anyway, our old pal, Darth (Judge) Ghis brings us aboard the Leviathan and demands the deifacted nethicite (ie, the Dawn Shard). Ashe at first refuses, but it then turns out that Vossler is in league with the Empire! He has apparently bargained Dalsmasca's freedom in exchange for the shard and also apparently believes the Empire. He hasn't been watching enough Star Wars.

- That, combined with some sword-based persuasion forces Ashe to hand over the shard which Ghis stuffs in the engines to test its power and ensure its authenticity. Ashe and company are carted away in chains.

- However, the engines start to go haywire (well, stick some mystical rock in 'em, and what do you expect?) spewing Mist which Vierra's are seemingly rather sensitive to. This causes Fran to go berserk. On the bright side, this provides a convenient distraction for busting out of our chains and beating up Vossler for his treachery.

- The party then escapes the ship just as it explodes, taking most of the fleet with it. Somehow, the Dawn Shard manages to survive and we fly back into the burning wreckage for it before making our final getaway.

- These events prompt Marquis Ondore (who moonlights as the narrator) to go underground and start pulling together various anti-Empire resistance groups. Ashe returns to Dalmasca, though she keeps a low profile while deciding what to do next.

- Meanwhile, in Archades, the Imperial Senate discusses the loss of the 8th fleet and Rozarrian military excersises which are believed to be a prelude to invasion. The senate wants Vayne recalled to answer for his decision to deploy the 8th fleet to the Tomb and also think that Larsa is shaping up to be a good potential future (puppet) Emperor, despite the current one's objections.

- Back in Dalmasca, Ashe has decided to use the Dawn Shard as her weapon against the Empire, but she needs to learn more about it so she decides to consult with Yoda in Dagobah, or rather, the Garif people who live far south and east of Rabanastre.

- We travel to the southwest across the Giza Plains (now in its rainy season) and the Ozmone Plains and arrive at the Garif Village and start asking about the nethicite but the elders are pretty useless on the subject and can only tell us that some Hume kid has been asking around the Village about the stuff too.

- The Grand Chief or whatever he's called is slightly less useless. He tells us that the nethicite was originally a gift from the gods to the Garif, but the Garif were too dumb to figure out how to use it so the gods took it back and gave it to Raithwall instead who put it too good use.

- Admitedly, the Grand Chief does know enough to tell us that the nethicite is currently drained of its power - a useless stone, but he doesn't know how to recharge it (or if that is possible), so Ashe's quest for a weapon seems to be stopping abruptly.

- Fate does not leave us without direction, however, as Larsa shows up (he's the one whose been asking about the nethicite). He's concerned about potential war between Rozzaria and Archadia. He fears that Rozzaria will use Ondore's resistance as some sort of pretense for invasion.

- Larsa wants the Gran Kiltias (or was that Quilter?) Anastasis (or something) of Bur-Omisase to declare Ashe Queen of Dalmasca so that she can hit everyone over the head with a big stick and try to bring everyone to their senses before things get out of control. He proposes an alliance between Dalmasca and Archadia to this effect.

- Ashe is, naturally, reluctant at first but Larsa points out that Dalmasca is conveniently located between the two empires and that his brother Vayne is kind of ruthless, it seems that Ashe has little choice if Dalmasca is to surive.

- Meanwhile, back in Archadia, some of the Judges discuss politics and wonder about Vayne's future. Gabranth and one of the others reaffirm their vow to protect Larsa from the senate once they discover he's not the puppet they think he will be. Dance!

- Anyway, it's off to Mount Bur-Omisase which is east of the Ozmone Plains, somewhere beyond the Golmore Jungle with Larsa as a guest - yay, free unlimited Hi-Potions!

- The first roadblock we encounter is in the form of some glowy magic barriers blocking key paths in the Jungle. Fran seems to be suffering from the paranoid delusion that this is a result of the fact that the jungle somehow hates her.

- She does some wavey thing in the air and reveals a hidden path to Eyrut Village, home to the Viera. She tells Vaan to go find Mjrn for her, but doesn't seem to want to enter the village herself.

- The Viera are a stand-offish sort who don't take kindly to outsiders, nor do they look kindly upon those who leave the village (such as Fran). As it turns out, Mjrn seems to have left the village and the elder, Jote, says some vague things about where she may have wandered off to.

- Larsa interprets her words to be referring to the Henne magicite mines which is in an area under Imperial control, south of the Ozmone planes so it's backtracking time! Just outside the entrance to the mines are some bodies including scientists from the Draklor Laboratories.

- In the mines, it seems Larsa was correct and we do find Mjrn, though she is not in her right mind (not unlike Fran back on the airship, actually) and she just runs off deeper into the mines. Oy!

- Chasing after Mjrn, leads us directly into Tiamat who seems to live in the mines and thinks we look tasty. After defeating it, we find the wayward Viera who falls unconscious and drops a piece of nethicite, which shatters, and some spirit thing appears briefly behind Mjrn and then vanishes.

- Back in Eyrut Village, we learn that Mjrn is Fran's sister. Some Humes had been through earlier, piquing her curiosity, so she went to investigate but got trapped in the mines after being given the nethicite as a sort of experiment (absorbing Mist or somesuch). Fran then forbids her from leaving the village again.

- For returning Mjrn safely, Jote gives us a magical knickknack that will allow us to pass through the barriers in the jungle, though it seems like the woods are still restless. It also turns out that Jote is also Fran's sister.

- On the way out of the forest, we are attacked by an Elder Wyrm, so perhaps Fran's paranoid delusions about the forest hating her might not have been entirely off-base.

- We exit the jungle into the Paramina Rift, a snowy mountain area. (Right next to a jungle? Ivalice has some weird geography, though perhaps the jungle goes up to the foothills and we are now up in the mountains above the jungle or something.)

- Meanwhile, back in Archadia... Vayne is entreating his father to shut down the senate because he thinks they have it out for house Solidor.

- Anyway, a short trip to the north east through the mountains brings us to Bur-Omisace and we run up to the temple thing to talk to this kilt-wearer guy, Anastasis. Turns out he doesn't wear kilts, or quilt anything, he's just got a funny title. He also dreams his life away, being some sort of dreamseer or somesuch.

- Ashe is about to request the Gran Kiltias confirm her as Queen of Dalmasca when she is rudely interrupted by some guy (who's obviously into fashion) and his retinue.

- Enter Al-Cid Margrace, a member of the royal house of the Rozzarian Empire. It was he and Larsa who had cooked up this scheme for peace, but there has been an unfortunate wrinkle in the plan: Emperor Gramis of Archadia is dead. (Cue flashback...)

- Meanwhile, back in Archadia, the Emperor lies dead, the blame for it placed on the senate (the leader of which is now also convenietly dead) with Vayne declaring himself Emperor and dissolving the senate.

- The Judges are gathered, and one, Drace, accuses Vayne of being behind all this and tries to arrest him. Unfortunately for her, the rest of the Judges seem to be in Vayne's pocket (not literally).

- Vayne orders one of the Judges to take the Alexander to go and retrieve Larsa. This is when Gabranth pipes up that protecting Larsa was his job. This doesn't earn him any points, however, and Vayne basically questions is loyalties and orders him to execute Drace whom Vayne has judged guilty of treason.

- Drace seems to accept the futility of the situation and tells Gabranth to go ahead and also urges him to continue to protect Larsa.

- We now return to Bur-Omisace. While the late Emperor would have at least listened to peace overtures, with Vayne's journey to the Dark Side now complete, there is no hope of that, he'd just declare Ashe an imposter.

- Vayne is gunning for war. Archadia's forces are massing and the nethicite is the secret weapon behind it all.

- Ashe decides she must fight fire with fire. The Gran Kiltias tells her that her last, best hope (for peace) is to find another of Raithwall's relics, the Sword of Kings, that was given to the Gran Kiltias back in the day. The Sword currently rests in the Stilshrine of Miriam at the southern end of the Paramina Rift - time for Tomb Raiding Part 2!

- The Shrine is large, but mostly uneventful (or as uneventful as a Shrine full of hordes of undead can be). The Esper Mateus, the Corrupt, guards the innermost chamber but is nothing our seasoned team of Tomb Raiders cannot overcome.

- Ashe claims the Sword of Kings and Vaan has the uncharacteristically brilliant idea of testing it on the Dusk Shard to see if it actually works. Ashe raises the sword to strike, but the stone spews out some Mist in an apparent attempt at self defense which makes Ashe hallucinate about her dead husband again, causing the strike to miss.

- However, it seems that the nethicite's attempt at self preservation has convinced the group of the Sword's authenticity.

- Once outside of the temple we see an Imperial fleet fly by heading north (presumably the Alexander gone to fetch Larsa) and, shortly later, an ominous plume of smoke, also to the north. Rather than use the teleport crystal we take a liesurely stroll back to Mount Bur-Omisace because I want more loot to sell!

- Back at Bur-Omisace, the Imperial army has been running rampant and have even entered the temple. The Gran Kiltias is now dead, slain by Judge Bergan who has the gall to demand we hand of the Sword of Kings.

- Fran senses some nethicite on the Judge and we see another apparition hovering behind him momentarily, like with Mjrn in the Henne Mines. Bergan blathers on about how Vayne will become a true Dynast King, wresting the control of history back into the hands of Man, unlike Raithwall who was a puppet of the gods - the man is clearly touched.

- Naturally, a fight ensues and Bergan is bested. He is, err, roasted inside his armour by the nethecite. Who wants barbeque?

- After the battle, Al-Cid comes out of hiding. He says that Larsa went off with Gabranth to avoid trouble, but Bergan begat trouble anyway. Al-Cid then tries to persuade Ashe to come back to Rozzaria to help convince them not to go to war. Ashe, however, has a Big Sword and wants to take her fight to the Empire and destroy all their magic rocks. Al-Cid acquieces and limps off to do what he can on his own.

- Balthier suggests going to the Draklor Laboratories, home of Archadia's weapons research program. But with the heighted state of military alert against possible Rozzarian invasion, the obvious routes (air and sea) will be guarded so the wiley Sky Pirate suggests sneaking in on foot via the Salikawoods - there's a hunter's camp on the border that may provide some cover.

- The long walk to the Empire starts from Nalbina Fortress, which is still being repaired as a result of the Archadian invasion two years ago. From there we head in a generally north-easterly direction through the Mosphoran Highwaste (a mountainous area) which eventually leads to the Salikawoods.

- There is a gate of unknown origin or purpose separating the far end of the Salikawoods from the Archadian lands beyond (my guess is they're trying to keep out the riff-raff). It's currently inopperable and is undergoing repair by some Moogles, or would be if most of them weren't slacking off in the woods. The foreman asks us to round them up.

- After running around the forest and telling the Moogles to get back to work, we are able to pass through the newly repaired gate (Moogles sure do work fast) and enter the Phon Coast, upon which we witness an Imperial airship patrol fly overhead.

- The Phon Coast is pretty huge, but we eventually find the Hunter's Camp. While the kids (Vaan and Penelo) go play in the water, Balthier asks Ashe if she really intends to destroy the nethicite or use it to restore Dalmasca. Ashe seems torn on this, and the Sky Pirate tells her a cautionary tale of woe.

- Cidolfus Demen Bunansa, the legendary Dr. Cid, head of Draklor Laboratories, became obsessed with nethicite, eventually alienating his family, including his son, who just happens to be Balthier. It also turns out that Baltheir was a Judge for a short period of time, but he ran away from all that, in part because he couldn't stand to see his father obsessed the way he was.

- Of course, now, Balthier is getting drawn back into things. Anywho, Archadia is still a ways to go. The locals helpfully tell us about some ruins that extend beneath Archadia, so that seems like a good way to go.

- After doing some hunting, we continue towards Archadia across the rest of the Phon Coast and the Tchita Uplands. At the north end of the Uplands is the entrance to the Sochen Cave Palace, those ruins that the people at the Hunter's Camp mentioned.

- The plan is to sneak up into Archadia via the ruins and hope nobody notices us. Great plan! What could possibly go wrong?

- The group spelunks through the ruins and comes up in Old Archades, basically the slums on the outskirts of the main city and the guards aren't letting the riff-raff into Archades proper. Balthier bumps into someone of his acquantance, Jules, a man of shady character. In exchange for some gil, he basically has us start a riot by spreading some rumours which draws the attention of the guards and allows us to slip into the city.

- In Archades, Balthier runs off to take care of some things and later sends a message by way of Jules to come meet him in Central. This leaves Vaan to run around the city playing matchmaker in order to earn the necessary cab fare.

- With cab fare earned, Vaan makes it to the upper-class area where Balthier lays out the plan: he's requisitioned a small Draklor airship which they can use to get in the supply docks. However, just then some Imperial Soldiers run by, having just finished putting down the Senate and some of them are reassigned to the labs.

- Seems Jules has been spreading rumours about Balthier's return (recall: Cid's his father) to create a bit of a hubub. He does, however, want an inside scoop on the lab's doings (they've been suspiciously silent since Vayne took over the Empire) and has arranged a cabbie to take Balthier and his groupies directly to the lab.

- The lab is quiet... too quiet. The bodies of soldiers are strewn about, it's so mysterious! Cid's bound to be on the top floor so that's where we're headed. On the way, we find one of Cid's offices which has been ransacked, but there's still a key card that's been left carelessly strewn about.

- Anyway, up to the top floor! We are attacked by a bald man with an odd fashion sense (pink pants? really? or maybe he's just a mathie...) who momentarily mistakes us for Cid's lackies. He realizes his mistake and runs off before we can find out who he is, so we follow to the roof where Cid waits.

- It's a happy father-son reunion betwixt Cid and Balthier. The scientist appears to talk to himself and seems to know who Ashe is and decides to test her: a good, old fashion, trial by combat!

- So we jab Cid with sharp objects until he falls down. Cid is cocky, even in defeat, and taunts us with the nethicite that we had come to steal. We also catch a momentary glimpse of an apparation behind Cid (similar to the one with Mjrn and Bergan) that the crazed Doctor refers to as Venat. He babbles something about history back in the hands of man and flies off in a personal airship, telling us that he's going to Giruvegan, suggesting Ashe might find her own piece of nethicite there, and dares us to follow. Balthier is not amused.

- The bald man then finally gets around to introducing himself as Reddas and suggests we get out of there.

- Meanwhile, the Imperial Senate has fallen. War between Archades and Rozzaria seems inevitable. Marquis Ondore has been gathering the rebel fleet (flagship: Garland) to meet Archades in battle.

- It turns out the Marquis had hired Reddas to infiltrate Archades and steal the nethicite (except Cid made off with it, foiling both his plans and Ashe's attempt to destroy it). Failing that, the Marquis is prepared to ally with Rozzaria, even if doing so would allow Vayne to potentially destroy both the resistance and Rozzaria in one swoop.

- Reddas brings the party to the Port at Balfonheim, a wretched hive of scum and villainy, at least until Reddas cleaned things up. The party decides to chase Cid to Giruvegan, rumoured to be in the Feywood, south of Golmore jungle. Meanwhile, Reddas has some other leads he's going to check on.

- After another hunting trip, we finally head to the Feywood, south of Golomore Jungle. Here, we come across a thick wall of Mist which dissipates after we stare at it for a while (presumably, the Dawn Shard that we've been totting around had something to do with that), though not before Ashe has another Mist induced halucination of Rassler (at least Vaan seems to have stopped his halucinations).

- Shortly thereafter we are set upon by a Rafflesia, an overgrown vegetable. It is kind enough to sap our MP, but not before we cast the important buffs and proceed to bash its face in.

- Continuing south, we play with some glyph thingies and come to a gate which requires Belias to be summoned to open (up until this point I had not assigned any Espers or Quickenings to my characters, but now that the plot demands a summon I just went ahead and had them learn all their Quickenings).

- This brings us to the Ancient City of Giruvegan. There's no sign of Cid yet so Balthier suggests waiting outside until he shows up, but Ashe starts to halucinate again and wanders off, so we give chase. She's going to be the death of us yet!

- A guardian statue provides only a minor speed bump in getting into the city. The interior of Giruvegan is somewhat odd looking - kind of spacey and stuff - with a giant crystal in the middle (itself guarded by another, not terribly threatening (for us) guardian monster - guess they don't make 'em like they used to)

- Towards the bottom of the crystal there seems to be large quantities of nethicite, harbouring untold powers. At the lowest level, Shamhazai the Whisperer (an esper and also not a threat) guards a waystone that teleports Ashe up onto some floating platform things.

- Here, Ashe meets a group of those strange apparitions things that call themselves the Occuria and claim to be undieing (and like unto gods). They proclaim to be the ones who gave King Raithwall his (magic) stones and to have shepherded Ivalice throughout the ages.

- The Occuria tell Ashe that Venat - that other Occuria who is working with Doctor Cid - is a traitor and that the manufacted nethicite he is teaching Cid to produce is an affront to nature. They have, therefore, chosen Ashe, being a descendant of Raithwall, to be their instrument in delivering judgement upon Venat and his (its?) cohorts.

- To that end, the Occuria give Ashe a fancy sword so that she can cut her own nethicite shards out of the Sun-Cryst, the source of all nethicite, which is located in some tower "on distant shore", the exact location of which the Ocurria are a bit vague on. With this, Ashe could destroy the Empire and, thus, reclaim her throne.

- It is also seems to be implied here that the Occuria may have been responsible for Ashe's hallucinations of Rassler, presumably so that she would be more receptive to their manipulation (though this is my interpretation)

- The rest of the party heard the exchange, though did not see it, and Basche counsels Ashe to ignore the Occuria as he thinks they go too far. Ashe seems undecided, but as the location of the tower is unknown at this point, it seems moot for the moment. Then Vaan of all people suggests checking in with Reddas, wondering if he might have discovered something useful whilst he's off doing whatever it is he's doing.

- Also, Cid is nowhere to be found and Balthier realizes that they've been used, tricked into this little side adventure to further Cid's nefarious schemes.

- Meanwhile, back at Archadia, Larsa is imploring Vayne to make peace with Ashe, saying that she doesn't want war. Vayne disagrees, but sends Gabranth off with Larsa to find Ashe and pass judgement on her intentions, killing her if necessary.

- When they have left, Cid receives word from Venat that Ashe and the others have taken the bait. The three discuss taking control of history back from the Occuria and giving Vayne what is his due (setting up Vayne as some sort of dynast-king himself)

- Back on Balfonheim, Ashe and crew reconoiter to find out what Reddas was up to whilst they were galavanting in Giruvegan.

- Turns out the ruddy sky pirate was following some other leads he turned up whilst nosing about in Draklor, leading him to the Cataract at Ridorana and the Pharos Lighthouse. However, the combinatation of cataracts and dense mist turned him back.

- The group speculates that the Pharos might be the "tower on distant shore" that the Occuria were babbling about and decide to investigate. Reddas gives Balthier a special sky stone that will allow the Strahl (Balthier's airship, if you recall) to travel in Jagd (another bauble he pinched from Draklor - say what you will, the man takes his pirating seriously).

- So it's off to Ridorana Cataract with Reddas in tow as a guest. The lighthouse is big - very big - with its very own guardian beast at the door (which we poke until it falls down). It also seems that good ol' Raithwall left a message for any who should come after him, though the message doesn't really say anything important other than an "I was here" sort of thing. At least we know that we're on the right track.

- However, it seems that Ashe is still undecided as to what she plans to do once she's got her hands on the Sun-Cryst - take revenge on the Empire, or destroy the nethicite, once and for all. But she's got a lot of time to think since it's a big tower.

- We climb up inside the Pharos doing some puzzle-y things and stabbing a lot of other things until they stop moving.

- Continuing to climb up this stupidly large tower, near the top we fight the Esper Hashmal, the Wroth, who tries to r0xx0r us but through the repeated application of pointy objects, it's us who do the r0xx0r1n9.

- The last section of the tower is, mercifully, free of monsters so the party takes a bit of time to reflect on the past. Ashe still seems undecided on her course of action.

- At the top, we find the Sun-Cryst, shrouded in swirling Mist. Ashe halucinates again about Rossler who seems to be egging her on to take revenge on the Empire. Still, Ashe hesitates.

- This is when Gabranth shows up (how'd he get here? did he follow us up the tower? maybe he flew? if so, why didn't we?). He admits that he was responsible, disguised as his brother, for killing King Raminas, and tries to provoke Ashe. This also inadvertently also provokes Vaan since that means Gabranth was responsible for killing Reks.

- Ashe chooses to forgo revenge - that is not the vision of the Dalmasca she wants and she does not believe her Rossler to be the sort to seek revenge. She slices the apparition of her dead Prince with her sword and before it vanishes it speaks with the voice of one of the Occuria, imploring her to do its bidding (thus seeming to confirm my earlier supposition regarding the nature of Ashe's hallucinations).

- Gabranth attempts to attack Ashe, to force her hand, but Reddas steps in. He reveals that he used to be a judge - Judge Zecht - and was responsible for using one of the nethicite shards at Nabudis at Doctor Cid's orders (he wanted to see what would happen), but after that Reddas renounced his place as a Judge and changed his name.

- Fight ensues with Gabranth, we make him fall down.

- Then Doctor Cid appears, to gloat and rave like a madman. He's come to observe the activation of the Sun-Cryst which is needed to activate the "Bahamut".

- Fight ensues with Doctor Cid. He summons the Esper Famfrit, the Darkening Cloud. Neither are immune to pointy objects.

- After the fight, Cid is consumed by the Mist and the Sun-Cryst is overloading - there seems to be no escape! But Reddas takes it upon himself to destroy the Sun-Cryst with the Occurian sword whilst the others flee. The top of the tower gets blowed up real good, Reddas along with it.

- The party returns to Balfonheim where they are met by Al-Cid Margrave. Al-Cid bears bad news: he was unable to prevent the Rozzarian Empire from seeking war. It seems that Rozzarian soldiers, under the guise of Marquis Ondore's resistance, made incursions into Archadian territory which prompted a response from Archadia. The Marquis was also forced to mobilize his fleets as a result (can't turn his back on his allies or some such).

- What this means is that the Rozzarian and Archanian Empires are now poised for a major clash, with Dalmasca caught in the middle. The Archadians also have the Sky Fortress Bahamut which was activated by syphoning off Mist from the Sun-Cryst before it was destroyed, thanks to good old Doctor Cid (everything's his fault - way to go Cid!)

- The only course of action seems to storm the Bahamut and put a stop to Vayne's schemes once and for all.

- After putzing around for a little bit (a few more hunts, tracking down some rogue Espers) it's time to join the fight.

- A menacing tornado is bearing down on Rabanastre - but wait, that's no tornado, it's the Sky Fortress Bahamut, kicking up a huge sandstorm.

- The Imperial fleet engages Ondore's Resistance. On the Bahamut, Larsa begs Vayne to show mercy, but Vayne intends to crush the Resistance permanently to prevent them from getting uppity in the future. Fighters are launched, the battle starts in ernest.

[Note: one of the Resistance ships that gets destroyed is the "Galuf-Val" which is a reference to one of the heroes from FF5.]

- The Strahl arrives on the scene and get Ondore's fleet to cover them, they're going in there. After some fancy flying by Balthier, the Strahl manages to dock with the Bahamut and its intrepid crew storm the Sky Fortress.

- After cutting their way through some paltry guards, the party comes to the main lift. Gabranth decides to show up and has some personal grudges to settle with his brother. The Judge talks a good fight, but is quickly introduced to the pointy end of several large sticks.

- That distraction taken care of, we take the lift up to the control room where Vayne and Larsa await. We exchange pleasantries and some rhetoric, but naturally there can be only one (course of action): fight! Larsa pulls his sword on Vayne, intent on stopping this madness.

- Vayne fights like a monk who likes to punch and kick. His fists are no match for our various sharp objects. Naturally, however, defeat is no obstacle as Vayne is transformed by Mist, courtesy of Cid's manufacted nethicite, and he conjures up some glowing, floating sword-things.

- Gabranth also drags himself to the scene, having decided that protecting Larsa is more important than sibling rivalries. He pulls his sword on Vayne and assists in the fight.

- Vayne Novus is not much more difficult than his first form and is dispatched with relative ease.

- Still hopped up on nethicite, Vayne manages to nearly kill Gabranth (though Larsa protects him) and Vaan takes the opportunity to stab Vayne with a sword. Venat intercedes before Vaan can finish the job, allowing Vayne some time to run away.

- On the deck of the Bahamut, Vayne tells Venat that he has failed and Venat needs to find someone else. The Occuria replies that he/it has succeeded: the Sun-Cryst is destroyed and the Occuria as a whole no longer have a hold on Ivalice's future.

- Venat then either merges with or imbues Vayne with moar power and Vayne starts merging with bits of the ship, transforming into some sort of cybernetic god-thing ('cause this is, you know, a Final Fantasy after all).

- The party catches up and, of course, can't let this go on. The new Vayne ("The Undying") actually puts up a bit of a fight, but not so much that we still can't bash him until he falls down.

- Vayne dissovles spectacularly. There is a moment of respite and then, oh hey, there's still this war thing going on. Not only that, but Vayne's death-throes have destabilized the Bahamut.

- The party makes it back to the Strahl. There is a minor technical glitch which Balthier and Fran go check out, leaving the Strahl in the hands of Vaan and Penelo - wait, is that a good idea? Also, the Bahamut's engines are failing.

- The Strahl stirs to life and takes off. Basch (posing as Gabranth), Ashe and Larsa all broadcast messages stating that Vayne is dead and that there is a cease-fire with Dalmasca. (You know they're serious 'cause they use their full names.) The fighting stops. However, the Bahamut looks like it's going to crash into Rabanastre, destroying the city.

- As the Alexander prepares to ram the Bahamut, Balthier cuts in: he and Fran are doing the handyman fix-it thing in the Bahamut (need more duct tape) and would really rather not be blown up just yet, thank you very much.

- Balthier and Fran manage to get the Bahamut's engines running again, enough to redirect it to crash (relatively) harmlessly out in the desert, though the fate of the two Sky Pirates is left a bit up-in-the-air.

- One year later, Dalmasca is more or less back to normal, though the ruins of the Bahamut are still visible from the city. Ashe's coronation will be taking place in a month and Basch has taken over Gabranth's job of protecting Larsa (Gabranth's final wish) to help keep the Empire stable and avoid civil war.

- Vaan and Penelo have been taking care of the Strahl, at least until it mysteriously disappears one day. A note has been left in its place, which seems to be from Balthier: he's going after the cache of Glabados and needs the ship. A similar note has been left with Ashe.

- Things end with Vaan and Penelo flying off to meet Balthier (and presumably Fran).