Mid-semester break

You know what's funny about this mid-semester break that I'm having? I've only just started my uni for four weeks (out of the 12 weeks of learning I'm suppose to have), and this 'mid-sem' break is comes in between the forth and the fifth week, which isn't the middle of the semester.

But I don't really mind, cuz I have plenty of assignments to do. To me, this isn't called 'mid-semester break'. It's more like 'Finish all your homework week'.

I have like a few lab reports, essays, and a group assignment to do. So yeah, uni life has been pretty terrible for me lately due to all the assignments that I have in one go, and piling up like a mountain that you have to climb to reach its peak but never had the chance to because it kept growing taller (some sort of analogy I have there).

And the worst part? I still wanna play my video games. I still want to continue my Fire Emblem games, and I actually plan to meet up with someone to buy his copy of Resident Evil: Revelations and Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D for the 3DS.

Oh well, I'll have to find a way to do both of these during this 11 day break I guess.

Finally defeated the most powerful Streetpass team that was sent to my 3DS!

If you actually follow this blog, a month back I got my first Streetpass tag in a shopping mall, and this guy happens to play Fire Emblem: Awakening like I do, and so his Streetpass team got sent over to my game. However, his team was quite powerful and I was unable to defeat him at that current time.

Not anymore.

As of this blog post, I was able to defeat his team of 8-9 characters with my team of only 4 characters.

Here's how I did it.

The save file where his Streetpass team appeared in was my first save file, a file that I hardly touch other than using it to play the DLC maps for fun, and play the Spotpass Paralogues. So my characters didn't really received much training at all.

But today, I played Paralogue 21 (Yen'Fay's Paralogue), and then I kept playing this save file. Then I saw the Streetpass team, standing there, mocking me as I could not defeat him. Then, I got an idea, a really bold one, but I still went on anyway.

Two of my most powerful members in my team are Lucina and Female Morgan. Lucina is a Falcon Knight who is very close to getting Lancefaire after changing class from a max level Dark Flier, whereas Morgan is a Swordmaster trying to get Astra, after getting Lethality as an Assassin, and as a max level Dark Knight earlier.

My plan was to use just these two to face his team. I was gonna pair Lucina with her husband (aka My Unit), and as for Morgan, I didn't have any idea who to pair her with, but for some reason, I felt like the Spotpass Black Knight was a good pair with Morgan, even if he received zero training from me after I recruited him.

So I went to forge Brave Lances for Black Knight and Lucina, and Brave Swords for Morgan and My Unit. Then I give the Black Knight 4 Elixers, and one each for the others.

Entered the battle preparations menu, used Gaius' and Kris' Confect to raise all their stats for the battle.

Then the battle, Morgan paired with Black Knight, and Lucina paired with My Unit.

I can't believe what I saw. It was really intense, but I was able to destroy his team. No elixirs were even used in the battle. My main worry (his My Unit and Morgan) were defeated in a turn, to my relief. And I was finally able to recruit him.

Whew! The most intense curbstomp battle I ever faced because prior to the battle, I had no idea whether my plan will work or not. It worked better than I expected in the end because I did not even soft reset at all. All it took was one attempt (with this plan).

Anyway, I'll be continuing my Hard-Casual save file soon.

Fire Emblem Awakening Streetpass Team Update

While spending most of my free time playing Fire Emblem, I've already got almost all the potential mothers together with what I considered the ideal pairing for my main Streetpass Team.

Just a note. I'll be using a lot of terms that people who aren't Fire Emblem players may not understand. So if you keep reading and wonder 'what the hell is this guy talking about?', don't say I didn't warn you.

Okay, where do I begin?

While pairing Chrom with Olivia is the best way to get the most powerful Lucina and Inigo, I stuck him with Sumia cuz I feel like pairing Olivia with someone else. Lucina and Cynthia will both get Aether and Galeforce from the parents. I'm currently planning on making Lucina a semi-tank of sorts, giving her both Aegis and Pavise to reduce damage dealt from the opponent. As for Cynthia, I was thinking of making her a Dark Flier or Bride, with either Lancefaire and Tomefaire, or some really good assist skills as a Bride.

For Lissa, I pair him with Vaike for a somewhat devastating Owain. He'll inherit Counter and Galeforce, and I'll give him Astra, Swordfaire, or Axe/Tomefaire as I'll make him a Dread Fighter.

Olivia will be paired up with Lon'Qu for Inigo who'll be either an Assassin, Dread Fighter, or Hero I have not decided on that yet. He'll get Swordfaire and Galeforce, with Sol, Astra, or Vantage.

Henry will marry Maribelle for a Sorcerer Brady with Counter, Galeforce, Tomefaire, and some other skills like Vengeance, Wrath, and Renewal.

Gaius will pair with Cordelia for either a Hero or Assassin Severa, with Swordfaire, Astra, Counter, Galeforce, and some skill that I have not decided upon.

Cherche is paired with Stahl for a Warrior classed Gerome, with Counter, Aegis, Swordbreaker, Res +10 from the Dread Fighter class due to his low Resistance and his undecided final skill.

While some people pair Kellam with Nowi for a tank Nah, I paired her with Donnel, giving Nah Counter and Tomefaire, and letting her learn Lifetaker and Galeforce to make her a Dark Knight.

For an extremely high magic character, I paired Ricken with Miriel for a Sage Laurent, with Lifetaker and Tomefaire from his parents. Other skills will be Counter, Aegis, and another undecided skill.

I plan to get MU to marry Severa based on how I build my MU (+STR/-MAG), for a Morgan who will be a powerful physical class that I have not decide yet.

That is for my main team. But I still have other mothers who isn't paired yet. And for the remaining children, this is what I plan to do.

Virion will pair up with Sully, and their daughter Kjelle will most likely be a General.
Panne with Gregor for an Assassin/Hero Yarne.
Tharja and Libra for Sorcerer Noire.

That's all for now, I'm trying to make this plan work.

So, I went for a Streetpass gathering today

It was the 3DS Streetpass 2nd anniversary or something. I was able to finish most of my assignments by Friday so I decided that I would attend this event.

It was a really cool experience, getting 20+ tags on my 3DS Streetpass is something that has never happened to me at all (I got 2 tags prior to the event). Also, some of them play Fire Emblem Awakening too (yay!), and I was able to battle their Streetpass teams.

Their teams were actually scattered across the three save files that I have. Though some of them were somewhat strong, they weren't as powerful as the first Streetpass team that I've encountered.

The teams that I fought were either weak team since the player only started the game, or a team that a person used to beat the game, which had around 3-5 capable fighters (Meaning rated above 200, while the highest could be 300+).

I was able to defeat all the teams. Good thing I was playing Hard/Casual since my planned Streetpass team was not strong enough to defeat some of theirs without losing members (unless I plan out my strategy really carefully).

Did I mention there was a whole Monster Hunters 3 Ultimate 'Guild' over there? There is like 10+ guys sitting in one area playing the latest Monster Hunters game together, how cool is that?

There was also some sort of trivia game which I took part in and won. I got a 3DS/DS cartridge storage thing. Yeah, I know my Nintendo quite well.

So yeah. It was a good day, cuz I had tons of tags today!

Quick update

Not posting anything in particular for this past few days due to a few things.

There is a 3DS Streetpass gathering happening this Saturday that I really want to attend, but I have a lot of assignments to do. Which is why when I heard about it, I've decided that I wanna go for this event, meaning that I'll have to spend my weekdays rushing up on homeworks, online quizzes, and assignments that are due the next week.

Which is why I've been busy lately, trying to rush all my assignments by Friday so that I can get an off-day playing 3DS with other people owning a 3DS in Malaysia.

That is all.

Making a Streetpass Team for Fire Emblem: Awakening

As I was approaching to beating my second playthrough of Fire EmblemL Awakening on Classic Normal, I suddenly have a thought. I did not have any other 3DS game other than Virtue's Last Reward (and I already completed that one), which means I'll have a high chance of replaying Fire Emblem for the third time. The question is: To make a Streetpass Team, or to play on Classic Hard?

I was thinking about that for quite a while ever since I completed the game the second time (using a female avatar this time) on Friday. I was still pondering about it on last Saturday. But in the end, I have decided to make a Streetpass team last Sunday.

The reason behind this was quite simple. Something happened on Sunday which made me decide that I'll be forming what I would consider a formidable Streetpass Team for Fire Emblem should I tag someone on Streetpass whom also coincidentally play Awakening.

Last Sunday, I went to Mid Valley (A huge shopping mall, in the top 20 list of largest shopping malls in the world if I remember correctly). I activated my Streetpass hoping to get tagged, and I did. But I did not just got tagged for Streetpass, I also got tagged for Fire Emblem. I was so happy so see a notification saying that a Streetpass team has now appeared in my Fire Emblem game.

So I went home, and I thought I could try to fight this person.

I was destroyed by this guy.

His team's stats are way better than mine, and some of his units have certain parts of their stats maxed out. So, till today I didn't recruit him. But because of that, it made me decide that I should make a Streetpass team.

However, the key thing in a powerful Streetpass team is the Children characters, and these characters can inherit certain skill from their parents. Like for example, if the last skill the parent before getting married learned is a skill that increases his max HP by 5 then his child will have this skill automatically.

In Awakening, there are some gender specific classes, meaning some skills are gender specific. There is a particular skill called Counter and Galeforce which are really good skills to pass on, and they are from gender specific classes. But while Counter is learnt by the male-only Warrior class, marry him with this as the last skill he learns and even his daughter will have it.

And that is somewhat of the main problem, which is passing down these skills. I need my parent characters to learn those skills before I marry them then the children will have them. But since I didn't plan this far ahead in my earlier two playthroughs this means I have to start from scratch. I decided that I'll play Casual Hard because I wanna get the feel of Hard mode without taking it too seriously since the main objective on this new playthrough is to make a powerful Streetpass Team.

There is another problem to this making of the powerful team. Due to the fact that Fire Emblem is a relatively new game, there isn't many FAQs or guides for the game. Finding a well written FAQ for Streetpass team building is practically non-existent at this moment. So, I had to use more than one resource and research the characters and who is their ideal candidate for marriage, and what skill to pass on to their kids.

While there are a few parent characters, I'm not going to pair all of them up for the sake of team building since there is a limit on how many characters will be in your Streetpass team. I just decide which characters I think will be better in this powerful team I'm about to make.

After an hour or two of researching, I have finally planned out how I want to make my team. So now, I have to set my plan in motion.

In earlier playthoughs of the game I always have the tendency to pair characters that I wanted to marry of together really quickly. This time, I try to avoid that and make support within the entire crew pretty balanced out. Plus, I have this thing where if I see that I can support a character with another one I have a huge tendency to click for support, and I wanna make sure it doesn't happen.

So far, I have only one of the children characters in my team. Fortunately for me, she has the right skills inherited from her parents as planned.

So now, I'm gonna get the remaining children characters, and I'll be very sure that they have the skills that I want them to have.

The bane of my existence

While I'm almost done with my first week of the new semester, I don't really have the mood to talk about it. Mostly because it is - for the most part - not that interesting (or at least, not yet). 

Today, I'm gonna tell you guys some series of events that occurred during my summer break, all pissing me off, and in the end, made me go into some sort of rage today.

One of the common rules in internet downloading (or at least one that I follow) is that you should never download a program you are not certain will give a virus. Also, you should always un-tick the option to make a toolbar on your internet browser should the installer ask you to.

This was a rule that my sister happen to not know of. You see, she downloads stuff from the internet, and installs them to the PC once a while, and just click 'Next' till the installation is complete. Then the next day when I check the PC, I see tons of unwanted toolbars, the homepage is changed similarly to the main search engine. It just piss me off. 

I admit, the two main browsers on the PC are Firefox and Chrome, and I don't use Chrome. But I have to consider the fact that my parents are using them. So whenever all these toolbars and homepage changes were made, I had to undo it and make the browser return to normal so my parents won't be wondering what's wrong with the browsers that they're so used to using.

While I did tell my sister not to simply install anything that interest her from the internet, she still remains ignorant about it. Saying lines like 'how would I know?' or 'it's not my fault this happen, it's the program's fault.' which really made me rage a lot inside me, and make me feel like giving someone a high five to the face with a chair.

Then one day, I saw this little thing called the 'FB downloader' appearing on the desktop PC's Firefox. I just remove it like normal. The next day, it appeared again. It went on for several days. I tried multiple different methods on each day, but no avail. Even trying uninstalling and reinstalling Firefox but keeping none of the passwords and all, and it still appears. So, I gave up for the first time, I couldn't remove it from Firefox. I was so mad and so disappointed in myself. I had no choice but to uninstall Firefox from my PC, never to install it again.

Then we reach today. My sister installed some stuff in the PC yesterday. And today, Google Chrome can't open. I've checked for solutions online, so real solutions to it. Uninstalling and reinstalling Chrome? The same problem will happen when you start up the PC the next time or when you restart the PC. I can't solve the problem like for the Firefox. This was the last straw for me. I was really raging. I feel like knocking 10 guys heads off with a baseball bat. I feel so pissed today that the whole crappy 45 minutes I spent trying to find parking in my uni this morning was like entering a zen garden.

In case you haven't figured it out. Any random toolbar, search engine, or change in homepage into some third party thing that appears in any main internet browser, be it my own laptop's, or the desktop PC in my home is the bane of my existence. I hate them so very much. 

Anyways, that's all I have for today. I'll be heading to watch a movie tomorrow, and maybe make a post about it next time.

Finished watching Fate/Zero within two days

It was a Friday night. And the internet in my home is being a bitch the laptop of mine. In short, while other devices including the desktop PC could access to the WiFi and internet in my home, my laptop can't. It is a problem that appears once a while to my laptop, but I got used to it. Plus, I still can spend time on the computer without using internet since I'll sure find something to do.

And then I realised, that I have the whole Fate/Zero anime and I've yet to watch it yet. I told myself to watch it since I've always wanted to. And I did, and I got hooked immediately.

Eventually, I finished watching all 25 episodes of the anime. And I find this feat to be rather impressive to myself. I would never normally do such a thing. The most episodes I could last watching in one sitting was at most 8 episodes, and that's only when I know I'm nearing the last episode.

But I did it. I watched 12 episodes in one sitting this afternoon. And I only stopped because my eyes were tired. So I had no choice but to take a long break.

Then I continued the last six episodes later that night. And the show has finally reached its conclusion. In my opinion, that was the most disappointing thing in the entire show.

The show had great quality. It has a great soundtrack, and really good animation. It has many great qualities that most anime lack. However, the ending, oh the ending. I really, really didn't like what they did.

Allow me to explain further.

The only reason why I watched Fate/Zero was because one anime reviewer on Youtube mentioned that this is one of the greatest animes in recent times, and it is quite different (in a good way) to Fate/Stay Night, which Fate/Zero is a prequel of. I never really got into Fate/Stay Night. I just didn't like it. Neither did the person reviewing the Fate/Zero either. However, he did mention that Fate/Zero - while being an outstanding anime - isn't perfect, due to it being a prequel to Fate/Stay Night, and having the ending set up the events of the anime.

And this is what I totally agree on. Which is why I felt unsatisfied. Maybe it's the execution. I think they trued to make this a tragic end, but to me, it didn't really seem that tragic at all. It all just happened because it was meant to happen, because some characters were supposed to be alive in Fate/Stay Night, that's why they lived.

Sigh.......

Anyway, this should be my last post before I enter my second semester of my uni life.

That's all for now, I guess..