Your gripes with CoC II

[Kingu2]

Was going to post this on another thread that got me thinking about this but thought it would be better here.

On second look back the whole kinu storyline is actually pretty bad. It's like a puzzle piece that's from an entirely different puzzle and way bigger than the other pieces that someone just decided to cram in there, fucking up a bunch other pieces to do so. For instance in order for the attack to have happened in the timeframe that it did, the story has to completely diseregard the possibilities that 1. the champion goes to Kiyoko's den on a regular or semi regular basis and 2. that Kiyoko might be a regular fixture in the champions party. It's a real stretch to believe that the champion wouldn't show up at some point during the event or the aftermath to notice all the blood and fire damage.

Barring that, with the torii sealed and them needing to get to Komari's den they would have had to walk through the wayfort to get there which begs the question why did no one stationed or living there say anything to the champion about the 50+ kitsune led by your wife that came through and if you're the Baron of the fort why they didn't shelter them for a while.

Barring that, how did the people Hawkthorne or the inhabitance of the forest not notice the massive fire going on only 100 meters away. you'd think these townsfolk would be concerned about a forest fire and at least send someone to check it out.

Barring that, Kinu was out for a couple of days after that fight which circles back around to how could this have happened without the champ noticing. Seriously the champ being a regular visitor at Kiyoko's leaves a massive plot hole in this story. All of these elements together reeeeeeally pushes the limits of suspension of disbelief at best. basically the rest of the world including the champion themselves have to just stop existing for a few days for this to work.

 

[WolframL]

The same explanation for everything related to pregnancy and how it's biologically possible to have the Champ's children* even be born when the story takes place in the span of a few months: The day tracker is essentially a handwave to allow X amount of time to pass between scripted events but canonically doesn't matter. In other words 'Repeat to yourself 'It's just a show, I should really just relax!'.

* Kiyoko's kits and Freja excepted, because they have a different handwave.

 

[wolfraider13]

The same explanation for everything related to pregnancy and how it's biologically possible to have the Champ's children* even be born when the story takes place in the span of a few months: The day tracker is essentially a handwave to allow X amount of time to pass between scripted events but canonically doesn't matter. In other words 'Repeat to yourself 'It's just a show, I should really just relax!'.

* Kiyoko's kits and Freja excepted, because they have a different handwave.

I get it. But like @Kingu2 was saying it's emersion breaking for me. I actually do enjoy the rest of the kitsune content, just not that particular portion of it so I usually just skip it, I haven't seen where it impacts my games in any meaningful ways if later on with an update it does I may go back and do them until then Raphael can suck it...

 

[WolframL]

And I'd respond that there are certain things you need to do to tell a story and if that means handwaving that there was a sequence of a few days that passed in the Casa de Kiyoko when you weren't present even if the player is capable of visiting it, then so be it. The alternative would be to set a period where you can't access it (or in the second one where Kinu just vanishes for a few days) for people who absolutely must have Muh Realism, but then people would complain about that too.

 

[wolfraider13]

And I'd respond that there are certain things you need to do to tell a story and if that means handwaving that there was a sequence of a few days that passed in the Casa de Kiyoko when you weren't present even if the player is capable of visiting it, then so be it. The alternative would be to set a period where you can't access it (or in the second one where Kinu just vanishes for a few days) for people who absolutely must have Muh Realism, but then people would complain about that too.

Fair point. I was simply stating My views and preferences. If the sequences become relevant down the line I'll go back and slog through them, I did half of it on one of my characters maybe I'll finish it to see...

 

[Nuin]

Was going to post this on another thread that got me thinking about this but thought it would be better here.

On second look back the whole kinu storyline is actually pretty bad. It's like a puzzle piece that's from an entirely different puzzle and way bigger than the other pieces that someone just decided to cram in there, fucking up a bunch other pieces to do so. For instance in order for the attack to have happened in the timeframe that it did, the story has to completely diseregard the possibilities that 1. the champion goes to Kiyoko's den on a regular or semi regular basis and 2. that Kiyoko might be a regular fixture in the champions party. It's a real stretch to believe that the champion wouldn't show up at some point during the event or the aftermath to notice all the blood and fire damage.

Barring that, with the torii sealed and them needing to get to Komari's den they would have had to walk through the wayfort to get there which begs the question why did no one stationed or living there say anything to the champion about the 50+ kitsune led by your wife that came through and if you're the Baron of the fort why they didn't shelter them for a while.

Barring that, how did the people Hawkthorne or the inhabitance of the forest not notice the massive fire going on only 100 meters away. you'd think these townsfolk would be concerned about a forest fire and at least send someone to check it out.

Barring that, Kinu was out for a couple of days after that fight which circles back around to how could this have happened without the champ noticing. Seriously the champ being a regular visitor at Kiyoko's leaves a massive plot hole in this story. All of these elements together reeeeeeally pushes the limits of suspension of disbelief at best. basically the rest of the world including the champion themselves have to just stop existing for a few days for this to work.

Not particularly so I think. While your reasoning isn't false per sé, it's based on many assumptions we don't exactly know about.

1. Distance
While on our map Kiyoko's Den doesn't look that far away from Hawkethorne - and Evergreen kinda reinforcing this "fact" with her statement of neighbouring Hawkethorne in a few decades - I think it's likely not just some 100 meters. If time passed moving on the map has anything to say in this matter and considering a normalized walking distance of 6km/h = 4mph, it's certainly not.

2. Army crossing Wayfort
The main problem here would be the order in which the story plot happens. Players are able to play through content however they want, and - say, you renovate the Wayfort much before doing Floofhouse or freeing your family - you are right. If you however would do the opposite and free them way before Winter City, then after managing all events there directly rush into the Rift and spend days solving that plot it's certainly possible. Which takes us to number three.

3. How did help get to Kinu fast
While the Torii Gate of Kiyoko's den was blocked off, it's never mentioned Floofhouse's was aswell. As the raid unfolds we are told Kiyoko is visiting Komari that night, so my assumption ever was that - while attempting to return home from her visit and being blocked off - she realized something very serious is happening right now. Imagining them making haste by teleporting to the wayfort gate with the help of Kohaku also wouldn't be that much of a stretch. Considering point 1 I'd assume it would take them between 2 to 3 hours from there to arrive in front of the den.

Conclusion
It's up to the player in which order he solves certain plotlines to be plausible. However, it can be plausible.

 

[Resawar]

I hope in the combat rebalance they hit holy damage the hardest with nerfs, with how often demons show up, and in the future maybe some undead. Both ice and storm seem to be in a good spot for neutral damage unlike holy as stated above, with fire and blight hitting the semi rare beast, fey, and the rare plant. Acid would be here if anything other then the spiral blade did it, not even acid flask does acid damage it does pure cunning damage.

It really does seem that holy damage weapons and power are the best in the game just to list off them:

Spoiler: Holy Damage Weapons and Powers

The Dawn sword, the Sanctified Gladius, and the Chrysanthemum Petal seem holy suited to wreck the entire game without fail with the Divine Blossom already having it's time in the sun not being overly busted. With powers Charge Weapon is free unresistible damage along with Celestial Smite, Jade Flame, White Fire, Holy Shock, and Smite Evil all having almost no downsides with the most gimmicky being Karmic Retribution while still being good and Aurora Arrow being an Ultimate and great.

The new Valkyrie TF blows the Kitsune god form powers out of the water with them all giving holy damage while Kitsune get stuck with the interior fire damage the second worst damaging type to hit some of the most common enemy's with Blight being number one. It feels like going Kitsune is a one way trip to gimping yourself to fight Demons, the Kitsune Tf could only topped by the Gothmander if all they got when the Tf comes out is blight damaging powers.

This bias negatively effect melee quite a lot with two of the best weapons being locked behind being good with under 20ish Corruption less they fallout of your hands reminding me somewhat of the OG Beautiful Sword. This all cumulates into this games best setup to beat one of the most common enemy types that being the Holy Spellblade Valkyrie Thief with the Dawn Sword and the Sanctified Gladius running Smite Evil and Charge Weapon with the choice of recharge powers.

Other weapons are great but seem more balanced by not hitting the number one incursion force in the setting super effectively and nothing else resisting it bar storm and ice damage being able to hit most enemy's for neutral, with of course some of these also being over powered like the Griefmaker.

 

[embersDiscarded]

The Acid Flask does do Acid Damage, it just doesn't directly state it.

 

[A1teros]

Damn, even after the Teatime for Dragon's quest has been updated, we STILL can't get any honey in our tea. Truly a travesty. Also, if you don't have sex with Kaina after the first meeting scene, her portrait still switches to the naked version anyway when moving to the scene where she actually gives you the quest which looks very weird if you never got down and dirty in the first place.

 

[ForeverLurker]

The tea time quest I honestly forgot who evelyn was then I checked the wiki and remembered. I just went azzy route evelyn wasnt really my cup of tea.

 

[Enigmatic D]

The tea time quest I honestly forgot who evelyn was then I checked the wiki and remembered. I just went azzy route evelyn wasnt really my cup of tea.

It's to be expected when it comes to certain fetishes that people like. Not everyone likes being submissive to certain people. I can understand not wanting to submit to a dominant woman with a dick. Sure, there are chances where you can have anal sex with her iirc, but I believe that requires you tending to her orally, anal, and vaginal before that happens. All in all, different strokes for different folks

 

[Nuin]

It's to be expected when it comes to certain fetishes that people like. Not everyone likes being submissive to certain people. I can understand not wanting to submit to a dominant woman with a dick. Sure, there are chances where you can have anal sex with her iirc, but I believe that requires you tending to her orally, anal, and vaginal before that happens. All in all, different strokes for different folks

That's exactly my gripe with Evelyn - or at least 3 of 4 characters gripes with her since #1 is a helpless romantic banging non-dicked characters only (and is even planned to be monogamous once v1.0 gets released), #2 strifes to stay maiden and #3 wants to dominate everything - hence I hadn't much interest in her content up till now. So for me she's kinda "Wsan's Kiyoko" regarding content gatekeeping Also that flags Azzy as those characters sole option for now.

If however there would be a different route, maybe even a sexless one, to befriend her implemented… that would change everything as I do like her in a platonic way.

 

[WolframL]

Alas, probably not happening. I kinda wish there would be one because my main Champ would probably get along with her platonically via bonding over some similar background elements, but that's not really what Ev is written for. Most of my other Champs are into her, but to each their own.

Wsan does have plans for an eventual 'Champ doms Ev' xpac but we don't know when that might materialize.

 

[MarcoPolo121]

Honestly Evelyn was interesting once but now I never interact with her. Prior to the expansion she didn't really have anything going on besides sex scenes which are all implicitly or explicitly dickgirl-domme which is definitely not my bag and also the way her menu was laid out was a massive pain in the ass so you had no guarantee you were going to get the scenes you wanted. Even now I see no reason to give her the mutually-exclusive Spear of Soft Femdomme when that can and IMO should go to Azzy since as a party member she gets much more out of it in the long term.

 

[Revenant]

I still wish we could either keep the spear for ourselves or destroy it so no one else could have it, either of those would even give a resolution for those that are locked because they corrupted Azzy and ignored Evelyn.

 

[wolfraider13]

I still wish we could either keep the spear for ourselves or destroy it so no one else could have it, either of those would even give a resolution for those that are locked because they corrupted Azzy and ignored Evelyn.

"I had two chances and chose none of the above. Now I'm angy about it." - also my 5'5 wyld elf so while I'm making fun I also feel the pain on one of my characters lol

 

[Revenant]

I do have Azzy, but not everyone does, the choices I'd like to have just happen to give a third or fourth way to end the quest for others.

 

[WolframL]

Even now I see no reason to give her the mutually-exclusive Spear of Soft Femdomme when that can and IMO should go to Azzy since as a party member she gets much more out of it in the long term.

If you're giving the spear to Evelyn, it's because you're into her content and want to see a different side of it, or you're interested in the fairly obvious story implications of what Evelyn wants to do with that power (that the game warns you about in bolded text will have consequences) or some combination of the two. It's not meant to have a mechanical benefit.

Obviously if you're not interested in either of those things, that's totally fine and so is giving it to Azzy, but 'Azzy gets more out of it' isn't really an accurate statement unless you're only looking at things through a gameplay mechanics lens.

I still wish we could either keep the spear for ourselves or destroy it so no one else could have it, either of those would even give a resolution for those that are locked because they corrupted Azzy and ignored Evelyn.

The Champ isn't royal even if they're of the Noble Scion background, they're a non-inheriting member of local nobility. So we're simply never an option to take the spear. There have been a few other characters mentioned on the Discord as potential options to take the thing, though most of the potentially qualifying characters that have been brought up are or will be potentially missable as well. The only character who's guaranteed to always be present in some capacity is Ryn and she's mooted because Ashe doesn't want to let her anywhere near the damned thing.

 

[Revenant]

The Champ isn't royal even if they're of the Noble Scion background, they're a non-inheriting member of local nobility. So we're simply never an option to take the spear.

I know, though what counts and doesn't count as royalty is flimsy since the one who decides is the spear in the end, I mean if Azzy is worthy then the gnoll princess should be too, even though their lands, subjects and claim is close to that of the lowest of nobility if even that, they are more like tribal chiefs.

In the end I just wanted the spear for myself because I like dragons and thought it was cool, the PC having it would also spare the developers from any major writing unlike giving it to another npc, but I am aware it most likely won't ever happen, thats why I'd be happy destroying it too.

 

[Nuin]

There have been a few other characters mentioned on the Discord as potential options to take the thing, though most of the potentially qualifying characters that have been brought up are or will be potentially missable as well.

Interesting…I'll bite. Is it possible to elaborate a bit on that matter? For the audience that doesn't use discord (yet at least).

Because Ashe's draconic conditions are fuzzy af to read into there's only few people coming to mind: Lyla, (doubtfully) Cait and possibly Ahmri?
A penny for your thoughts.

 

[Ultra Chad]

I don't want to give the spear to Azzy as I love bimbo Azzy. I also don't want to be dominated by Evelyn. So I have no reason to do this quest sadly.

 

[wery12345]

-Y'all mind if I snip this-

I mean its pretty plausiable for the champ to have been gone long enough for her to recover and a lot of the damages to be fixed, and the champ not being in the vacinity, like when you save the centaur village. Your taken out of the game for a couple of days to clean that up, also Kiyoko does show up towards the end, which implies she was just at Komari's probably catching up with her. Its probbaly how they realized "Oh hey I cant fucking teleport back to my den something is wrong".

 

[TVGuru]

For instance in order for the attack to have happened in the timeframe that it did, the story has to completely diseregard the possibilities that 1. the champion goes to Kiyoko's den on a regular or semi regular basis

Visiting your wife and daughter on a regular basis is pretty creepy dude.

 

[ForeverLurker]

Visiting your wife and daughter on a regular basis is pretty creepy dude.

comming home from work is creepy??

 

[Alypia]

I don't want to give the spear to Azzy as I love bimbo Azzy. [...] So I have no reason to do this quest sadly.

Bimbazzy is a lovely bean for sure! But the Dragoon set is still just a set. You can switch Azzy out of it whenever you wish and bring her back to her Hive Knight or Bimbo personalities. All the spear does for her is give her another option.

Still! If it's not your thing, not your thing. That's fine and valid too.

 

[wolfraider13]

A wiseperson once said "Opinions are like *ssholes- everyones got one and they all stink."

I like @Alypia's take...I may not agree with your opinion...heck I may even tease you about it, cause I tease everyone even myself, but you are welcome to your opinion as long as you aren't hurting anyone else lol

 

[WolframL]

I know, though what counts and doesn't count as royalty is flimsy since the one who decides is the spear in the end, I mean if Azzy is worthy then the gnoll princess should be too, even though their lands, subjects and claim is close to that of the lowest of nobility if even that, they are more like tribal chiefs.

Interesting…I'll bite. Is it possible to elaborate a bit on that matter? For the audience that doesn't use discord (yet at least).

Because Ashe's draconic conditions are fuzzy af to read into there's only few people coming to mind: Lyla, (doubtfully) Cait and possibly Ahmri?
A penny for your thoughts.

The fuzziness is apparently deliberate, as Savin and Tobs had an on-channel discussion about leaving it vague until it's necessary to provide the specifics. Clearly there are specifics but those are confined to a select few right now.

Savin's mentioned Kythie, the 'mander princess of Tychris who isn't currently in the game (and won't be for a while) as an obvious candidate, but he's also said in a completely unrelated conversation about his plans for her that Kythie's initial content includes the possibility of locking you out of her future content so she'd probably be just as potentially missable as the existing options.

Garde (probably jokingly) suggested Ahmri but you can miss her if you fuck up Harbouring a Fugitive, and whether she even qualifies is debatable. Tobs specifically said that just claiming to be royal and controlling a chunk of territory isn't enough, so the lupine jarls are specifically out as are their descendants. That would presumably nix Ahmri and Atani, and Gnoll Princess on the various beses of 'non-hereditary position that doesn't even claim royalty', 'doesn't claim royalty', and 'self-claimed, actual control is questionable'. That's not confirmed, just my thoughts based on what I've seen.

Savin's also said that Cait was the closest of the existing characters to qualify due to having a royal ancestor, but she's too far removed to count any more. Likewise he's said that hypothetically King Kelsaz and any children he may have would certainly be legitimate spear candidates.

 

[TVGuru]

comming home from work is creepy??

According to some.

 

[CasualAntlerEnjoyer]

I'm personally all for destroying the spear.

Too many magical weapons and artifacts in the world as it is, people should just be finding lightly used iron swords made at the smithy down the way when they go exploring mysterious caves and other hidden places.

"Wait adventurer! Only those of royal blood can remove that spear!"
"The fuck? Why?"
"So there's actually something noteworthy about it."

 

[MarcoPolo121]

I don't want to give the spear to Azzy as I love bimbo Azzy. I also don't want to be dominated by Evelyn. So I have no reason to do this quest sadly.

Just take the spear out, and switch Azzy back to Bimbo. Best of both worlds.