Lurker > trdl23

I was about to say well at least shes harder than Kanako and then I remember how ridiculous Kanakos final spell card is...

Or you could just use MarisaBugged for Mountain of Faith and cruise control to victory lol

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Blob

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Oh, and that final attack? Yes, the sun is exerting a gravitational field and trying to pull you inside of it to be incinerated. You have to actively fly back more and more strongly as it grows stronger. I think that's the first time in the series a boss's attack had forced your character to move all on its own, and in a game with as many twitch-dodges as Touhou, it's a bit of a game-breaker.

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#23: The Hell's Sun (Utsuho Reiuji, Touhou 11: Subterranean Animism)

I wanted to go see above ground for myself... And then I'll melt it all away with my atomic fire.

https://youtu.be/vx3Kp7uRiBI?t=120

By the time I got around to playing Subterranean Animism, I'd seen some shit in Gensokyo. A maid who was an anime girl version of DIO, a ghost who can kill you by just wanting to, a goddess who was taking away all of my business, and even jackass squatters from the moon. Yes, really. Touhou is a crazy-ass fever dream of a series, and bless ZUN's perpetually drunken soul for it. Just in this game I'd wrestled an oni, had a psychic jerk use my tag-team-partner's magic on me, and fended off a catgirl who really, REALLY wanted my corpse along with her zombie fairy brigade. I figured I'd seen most everything that this game could call a bullet. Now it's time to beat up the bad boss, stop the vengeful spirits from leaking back above ground, and go drink some tea. That's how Reimu rolls.

I did not account for a birdgirl to have swallowed a god, gained the power of nuclear fusion, and started planning the annihilation of everything outside of the underworld. I had certainly not accounted for said bird shooting miniature suns at me Jesus fucking Christ

Pretty much all late-stage Touhou bosses are awesome. It's just how the series works. They're quite evocative to boot, especially when it comes to the special "spell card" attacks that the games are famous for. The music is legendary for a reason and captures the essence of each character. But Utsuho packed a punch not just for coming out of left field in a series where I thought nothing could surprise me anymore -- the real killer moment was the extra sound design that went into her spell card declarations:

CAUTION! CAUTION! CAUTION! The words scroll across the screen as honest-to-God nuclear warning klaxons blare in my ear. Beyond just cool music and ridiculous bullet patterns to dodge (by the way, you have no HP; one hit = one life lost), the additional aesthetics get me on the edge of my seat. This dumbass bird is playing with actual nuclear power, and we are immediately fucked if I don't deal with her right here, right now.

Finally, in true Touhou fashion, Utsuho gets this whole "cleanse the world in nuclear fire" shit out of her system after I smack her down, and we find out this whole thing was a plot from the antagonists of the previous game to generate electricity for their worshipers. That way, they could attract more followers and faith. A Moriya Shrine Conspiracy. God damn it. Another day in the life of a miko with no social skills.

In case you were wondering... that's just the fight on normal mode. You want to fight Utsuho on the hardest difficulty? Get ready to put some hair on your chest because I sure can't do this:

https://youtu.be/BQLIaZUOnBU?t=123

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Did you know that older editions of D&D had mimics that were intelligent and even capable of negotiating with the PCs before blades were drawn? I had listened to a YouTube video titled What they dont tell you about mimics and its pretty fascinating. Theres a nice brief history of them here as well:

https://themackenzieblog.com/2018/09/10/monster-monday-mimics/

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Grimlyn posted...

why does this happen

People dont understand Dunning-Kruger and keep trying to convince someone to improve

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Up, update will come tonight
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https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning-Kruger_effect

He hasnt gotten better in this long; hes not going to get better.
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Nelson_Mandela posted...

SavageInTheBox posted...

Book of Mormon debuted this decade

Also LMAO women's sports

I'm doing best musical next!

Oh hell yeah.
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Catposting is cheat
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Is Eureka still relevant? I thought that was just SB content.
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https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/feature/play-design-lessons-learned-2019-11-18

Rare footage of WotC acknowledging they done goofed at the design level
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Never heard of it, Im afraid.
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No writeups today because of other plans, but the next update will feature the following (feel free to guess for fun):

-A manifestation of sexual confusion and gender roles!
-A bonus boss you can only fight by getting all the collectibles across two entire games!
-NUCLEAR LAUNCH DETECTED
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RIP my playset. I didnt think it would get banned given how long it took them to ban Top a while back.
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#24: The Abysswalker (Knight Artorias, Dark Souls 1)

...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgy1TV12LDc

Now that's one hell of a way to introduce your boss.

Ornstein and Smough are the bosses that come to mind for most people when they think of Dark Souls 1, but Artorias is often a close second. Oddly enough, the big reason why we love Artorias so much is because he doesn't play by the rules of DS1. He's hyper-aggressive, it's hard to read what he's throwing out most of the time, and he just keeps swinging at you. Considering how deliberately clunky Dark Souls 1 gameplay is, his smooth transitions and difficulty to read stand out. It's an absolute thrill to learn his patterns, and then panic when he decides to change them. He's not quite playing Bloodborne, but you can see the seeds of that game in this fight.

I contend that Artorias has the best aesthetic of a corrupted knight in gaming. He drips the darkness of the abyss, even weaponizing it occasionally. His sword attacks are wild, but they still have that modicum of technique to keep them deadly. Unlike most bosses, he plays your game too, dodge-rolling away from your attacks and taking time to reassess his situation. Most of all, he's not that much bigger than you -- a cool foil to the player, and also impossible to juke underneath him like we all did to his poor doggo Sif.

His lore is pretty cool too, though like most Dark Souls lore, you have to dig deep to find it. I won't bore you with it here, but you can look it up on the wiki. It's good stuff. Sadly, it doesn't do much to enhance the boss fight with story hype like Yunalesca or many other on this list, but Artorias doesn't need to rely on that. He's a damn fun fight that's hard-but-fair, and taking him down was the most satisfying experience in DS1.
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#25: This is it! Now is the time to choose! (Yunalesca, Final Fantasy X)

It is better for you to die in hope than to live in despair. Let me be your liberator.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_vmauwceK8

I've said before that the cutscenes leading up to Yunalesca are the best cutscenes in video game history. The twist is gut-wrenching, the team chemistry is stellar, and it's just the perfect game-changer in the minds of all the characters and the player alike.

So why is Yunalesca so low on this list? It's actually a testament to how damn good the writing and pacing is that it made the list in the first place. The fight... well, it isn't actually all that fun.

It's unique, don't get me wrong. The status effects keep you on your toes, and it's a surprise to have a boss start pulling the "revive kills zombie" cheese on you. Try to go EZ Modo with an Aeon? She'll Mind Blast and Absorb to fuck its shit up. Her design is awesome too, starting sexy as a goddess in this setting should be, then growing ever more monstrous as her inner wickedness is revealed. The struggle feels genuine, and it takes great management of your action economy (or, if you're cleverer than me, some well-timed Reflects) to deal with the ways she inhibits your healing, strips you of your buffs, and shuts up your spellcasters for daring to try and counteract it.

And then Mega Death happens and the enjoyment drops substantially.

I should clarify: I have no problem with difficulty, as you'll see later on this list. But I despise "gotcha" mechanics with no precedent and no warning. This is especially true in a story-rich RPG where it feels meta-gamey that the characters will prep for a move they have no knowledge of, just because the player was gotcha'd by it and reloaded the save. Is this a weird thing to be irritated about? Probably, but it's one I've always had. In this case, Mega Death punishes you for reacting to all the other mechanics correctly and curing the Zombie status on your party members by insta-killing anyone without the status or Deathproof. There really is no way to see this coming aside from a guide.

All that being said, one terrible mechanic isn't enough to destroy all the story hype, uniqueness, and straight-up badassery that Yunalesca entails. Beating her was the turning point of the game for me, and it set up the story to become what I consider the best in the franchise.
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Well, it took me a while to nail down what to put where, but the list is done and it's time to get these writeups going!

Some notes on how I made this list:

-The list considers gameplay much more than my previous top moments list. GLaDOS is a fantastic antagonist but that final fight in Portal 1 wasnt great, so shes not here. No VNs here either.
-However, gameplay isnt everything! Narrative focus and character quality separate the good from the great.
-If I didnt play it personally, I am not ranking it. Sorry, Bloodborne. If there are games in a franchise or significant routes that I havent played, I will note it below.
-Recurring bosses are considered as a set -- though
-As my previous ranking topics, I am limiting myself to only 4 entries per franchise at most.

I was surprised to discover just how many of my favorite games/series didnt actually have good bosses! Fire Emblem being an easy standout. The gameplay just isnt conducive to it since its much more built around scenarios.

I tried to run a predix contest but only got two entries... but that's no problem! The list must go on!

The list will be from the following franchises:

-Final Fantasy
-Touhou
-Persona
-MadWorld
-World Of Warcraft
-Metal Gear
-Golden Sun
-No More Heroes
-Pokmon
-Undertale
-Supergiant (Combining all of their games into one franchise)
-Risk of Rain
-Devil May Cry
-Dark Souls

First writeup tomorrow!
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ChaosTonyV4 posted...

trdl23 posted...

Didnt feel as good about the interview at Ross as I did at Yale. I always hate it when I have to go into the tank for like a minute to get a good answer to a question.

What kind of question?

It was something like "tell me about a time when you had conflict with a colleague, and how did you resolve it?" Problem is, I'm in a small office, and everyone in it works really well together. I ended up defaulting to an issue I'd had with our office in Japan, but that issue didn't get resolved in the positive way one would want to say in an interview; it's all I had.
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Not much of a contest with two entries. I'll just get the topic up later tonight.
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Working on Harvard's app now. As much as I hate tough word counts, having no word count is harder!
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Winona
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Everything in this sentence is perfect.
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I think this is my first trip to top 20 territory!
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SaveEstelle posted...

i WANT , a stupid award

The SaveEstelle Award for Returning B8 Users

We named it after you as a joke because we thought you were gone for good...

Im glad we were wrong.
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Up
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Talirah
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Oh yeah, literally the first thing I did when I got done with the last 3.0 trial was run to Rhalgr's Reach and get Scaevan gear. I'm average ilvl 395 now since I upgraded the weapon and a couple other pieces.
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Y'shtola is what happens when you put a lot of cat in your catgirl.

She's a very entertaining jerk, is what I'm saying.
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Artemis

Doggo is too powerful
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Perhaps something like that.

Hopefully we get a couple more now, but this topic is launching this weekend come hell or high water
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E come vivo? Vivo!

Didnt feel as good about the interview at Ross as I did at Yale. I always hate it when I have to go into the tank for like a minute to get a good answer to a question.
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E come vivo? Vivo!

The War of the Spark novel has its sequel out now, and it somehow looks even worse than the first!
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Are we going to keep stats tracked here?
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Obrov
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Yoshiki
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Yeah I realized the VC boss was number 26 because my original list formatting was off...
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Llarian posted...

Yeeees.

The Kobayashi Maru award for Crisis Management

Being married to a Mercs leader truly is a no-win situation when the season is live
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@Snake5555555555 You are free to change your list based on new information
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I dont want to give the entire list away, but you are correct I need more detail since right now there are too many options.

The following specific games/expansions are represented on the top 25 list.

Final Fantasy:
-VII
-IX
-X
-XIV Heavensward
Touhou:
-Perfect Cherry Blossom
-Imperishable Night
-Subterranean Animism
Metal Gear:
-Solid 1
-Solid 3
-Solid 4
-Rising
Persona
-3
-4
-5
Pokmon G/S/C
World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King
Golden Sun: The Lost Age
Transistor
Pyre
No More Heroes
MadWorld
Devil May Cry 3
Dark Souls 1
Risk of Rain
Undertale (no genocide)

25 bosses from 25 games. Wasnt intentional, but it should remove a lot of the ambiguity!
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Got through base MSQ for Stormblood. Now for patch quests. And Omega.
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MajinZidane posted...

post

Best B8er I have ever met IRL

Nothing funny for this one :)
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Raka_Putra posted...

Me please.

See? This is who one of the Tony awards was supposed to go to! Hand it over, CT!
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UF8 posted...

Don't worry, I already know I got it

Most Outfield Collissions in the 2019 Toledo Mud Hens' record books.

If you really got it, you should call that out to your teammates so they don't go for the ball too!
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MetalmindStats posted...

"Best B8 User Who Joined in the Past Five Years"

- NFUN, or something like that

4th Prize in the Self Aggrandizing Category of the Under-5 B8 Users Club. Just missed the podium!
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Umbreon posted...

...

Rookie of the Year from the Hyrule Antagonists' Club

DoomTheGyarados posted...

This should be excellent.

Oh, um... hm. This is awkward. I was told you had already received the Ocelot Award from Kojima, but now it appears to be lodged in my spine. And it seems I'm not the only one with an acute case of trophy-to-the-backbone. You've been busy, huh?

KCF0107 posted...

Award me!

Colonel Sanders' Acronym Imposter Award!

It's actually just a trademark lawsuit. You're due at court next Wednesday, 7 a.m. sharp. Otherwise the colonel is getting out the jumbo fryer.

ChaosTonyV4 posted...

oh hell yeah

I was thinking of what award to give you, but it turns out you already have an award. A lot of them, even. You can't hoard all the Tony awards! You'll send Broadway into complete chaos! Give them back!

swirIdude posted...

This is my post.

2nd place in the postmodern post architecture contest hosted by the Atlanta post office, posted today on the front door. Be posted: This is not the same as an Atlanta postal office. The post office is only concerned with posts.

MZero11 posted...

I would like an award

Official Award Recipient Award from the Award Receiving Guild.

I... I think this is getting a bit meta for me.
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I am happy either way
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E come vivo? Vivo!

Kamek, Kanz, and I are still making steady progress. Remaking half of the existing infrastructure and codifying all of it for consistency are rough time sinks, especially between IRL commitments.

Were also trying to get as many builds done as possible before we even start the game so we dont need to add more on the fly and end up with a week 41 situation.
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Johnbobb posted...

6

Khalasars Prize from the Kirby Culinary Institute

Unfortunately, its a bit of a dubious award since it involves being devoured by Kirby afterward. Still, you knew the risks when you signed up!
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Steiner posted...

i live for stupid awards

The Beatrix Award for Outstanding Adelberts. Lucky bastard...

scarletspeed7 posted...

nice

Gold Medal in the triathlon during the 2016 Comic Shop Olympics, setting a world record score in the DC category. Best of luck defending the title next year!
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