Gundam Battle Operation Code Fairy: First Impressions

by Phoenix | Nov 7, 2021 | GBO Code Fairy, GBO2, Pinned

It took me a while to get around to this, but I’m glad I did. Gundam Battle Operation Code Fairy is the latest Battle Operation title, and something I’ve been hoping Bamco would get around to for a long time. This type of game engine and style is perfect for PVE and Code Fairy proves it. CF also does a few other things while it’s at it.

STRAIGHT OUTTA SIDE 3

The Story

The story is typical of Gundam sidestories, and I mean that in a good way. Forming a squad of mostly fresh pilots and sending them out on missions is a classic approach and something Gundam rarely screws up, especially in the Universal Century timeline. I’ve got access to all three volumes, but I wanted to take a break after Volume 2 to get this first impressions post up while my thoughts on Volume 1 were still fresh.

The squad consists of Alma Stirner, the Raid type pilot that you control, Mia Brinkman, the General type pilot, and Helena Hegel, the Support type pilot. Alma gets in people’s faces and stun combos them to death, Mia lays down several different kinds of ranged argumentation, and Helena picks off stragglers with a sniper rifle. It’s the kind of well rounded team that reflects Gundam Battle Operation 2’s rock-paper-scissors mechanic perfectly.

To no one’s surprise, the new(est) girl, Alma Stirner, is slated for the position of team leader, more or less from the get go. I feel like the game is dropping little hints here and there that Alma could become a newtype, but that doesn’t always happen in these stories. Still, UC Gundam has trained my brain from youth to expect newtypes to blossom sooner or later.

Things start off in September of the year 0079, so well into the war and just as the White Base is starting to become a serious pain for Zeon in the original series. After the introductions–and I just say that ‘Killy’ is a hilarious name. I’m sad the CO isn’t piloting these days–we’re familiarized with the all too familiar controls and do some mock fights. The first real mission comes up afterward and I loved it.

See, Gundam, and UC in particular, has this thing about war that feels so ‘all aspect.’ We’re told that our base needs to stay hidden at all cost, so whatever units were just detected need to be discouraged from coming any closer or outright destroyed. It does not matter if they’re friendly units or not. That kind of mission, and one dropped on pilots like Alma, Mia, and Helena of all people, is really interesting. Imagine if your first mission involved firing on your own side. It was the right amount of tension and mystery to start things off. The Federation and Zeon are both kind of crazy at their core and the side stories in the UC timeline always make sure to touch on that when and where they can.

Fortunately for Noisy Fairy, what they thought was a friendly Zaku was anything but.

Aside: It may look strange, but having vulcans on one side is a real space saver.

So we started blasting. The Zakus went down. The tanks went down. The tension went down. It was a great time.

I will say that the individual volumes are way too short. There’s no way I can really justify the price point for the amount of content (story included) that’s here, but considering it was based off the engine of a free-to-play title, there was probably some kind of reasoning for it. Ideally, Code Fairy could have been the PVE portion of GBO2, an expansion, basically. The problem with that is that GBO2 is a free-to-play game. There aren’t even premium subscriptions like on some of today’s MMOs to help with upkeep. Recouping the cost of making this game without having it be a standalone title seems unlikely. As it stands you’re paying for a full priced game and getting 6 missions, some simulator extras, and a handful of short animations. They could definitely add more to this in the future if they want, so here’s hoping.

The Gameplay

The gameplay is already well established in GBO2, so it’s all around solid. The mobile suits play exactly the same here, so I picked up the controls almost instantly. The only thing that gave me trouble is the Y-axis controls, which I have inverted in most games. Yeah, I’m one of those guys. Anyway, once I got past the first tutorial fight I was able to change it and we were golden.

In GBO2 it’s next to exclusively Player vs Player, so the suits are balanced with that in mind, and most of the mechanics reflect the delicate balance of capturing, defending, or destroying key locations. You can also directly repair your mobile suit with a repair tool while you’re in the field.

In Code Fairy, all of this is simplified and rolled into one key feature: capture points. Once you hop out of your MS, you begin the capture process. When that’s done and you hop back in your suit, it will automatically start repairing.

There’s a limit to how much repairing can be done, and a percentage gauge will deplete from 100% to 0% as your HP goes up. It also works on your squadmates. I don’t have a good idea of how much you can repair at most, but I’m guessing at least one full repair and maybe some extra. Again, I haven’t gotten a good fix on this or done any testing. All I know is that, while repairing per capture point is limited, it’s very generous.

Like GBO2, Code Fairy’s fights boil down to piling on as much damage as possible before the enemy’s I-frames kick in, and being ready to repeat the process as soon as those I-frames stop. Since it’s PVE and not PVP, the enemies are hopelessly predictable. That doesn’t mean it’s always a cakewalk. In Volume 2 I ran into some trouble when these hopelessly predictable mobs tried to pile up on me the same way players would. Support types can be difficult if they’re up on a perch; they will not hesitate to shoot you in the face while you’re climbing up after them.

Never underestimate the high ground.

The Graphics

I have this game for PS4 and it looks great for what it is. More importantly, it looks exactly how Gundam is supposed to look. The way the human character models are rendered is different from GBO2 but I’d say that’s a good thing. CF’s characters are more vibrant and lively. In hindsight, I wish they’d gone with this stylized look from the start. They look a lot better than the uncanny, almost-not-quite realistic look of GBO2’s character models. There’s also a touch of Valkyria Chronicles in Code Fairy here and there.

The mobile suits all move perfectly considering what they are. These things weigh 100 tons and you can feel that weight being expertly balanced by the UC’s cutting edge technology. The animations are just as smooth as before, and the addition of cutscenes really shows how expressive the models can be. Honestly, I’ve never seen such ‘cutesy’ Zakus before (mainly Alma and Mia). No not even ‘Lacus Clyne’s’ pink Zaku Warrior holds a candle to the Fairies.

Simulator and Data Link

The simulator has three modes, Situation, Cost Match, and Training. I haven’t had time to really break into this, but after the story missions, I think this will be one of Code Fairy’s main draws. Cost Match is simpler and more reminiscent of GBO2’s PVP matches. The units you can use are restricted by their point cost. Simple as that. Training is just the tutorial mock battles from the story. You can replay them to brush up on the controls or certain mechanics.

You can also link your GBO2 save data with CF. The only point of doing it (as far as I can tell) is to get the CF units, but that beats the crap out of an event gacha in GBO2. I’m so glad they didn’t do that for Code Fairy’s release.

The Characters

I’ll end this first impressions with some of the characters. I can’t say there are any duds in the cast, but I’m slow to make those kinds of judgements with how little screentime there is to go around. Part of the reason I’m only covering some of the characters is because there’s almost nothing I can say about some of the others until I’ve seen more of them. That’s just how it goes sometimes.

Alma: Interestingly, while Alma gets the most screentime, I can’t say she’s the most interesting overall. For me that’s got to be her CO, Killy Garret. As for Alma, she’s fun. Energetic, reactive, always ready to get in and get her hands dirty. I used to picture raid type pilots as edge lords, but Alma’s showing me a brighter, cuter alternative. She also keeps the tension down so I’m not constantly on guard for sudden tragedy and character deaths … so if CF decides to spring that on us later it’s going to hit like a truck.

Mia: She’s not just a pilot, she’s an engineer from Zimmad. That’s definitely going to be important later, if it isn’t already. As for her personality, she’s shy but excitable. She’s also noticeably responsible, seeing how she tried to take the blame for her slow reaction time during an important phase of an escort mission. Given the circumstances, she did fine. Like Alma said, everyone survived so it’s all gravy. Also, can I just say how hilarious it is for this girl to have so much firepower bolted onto her Zaku and still be carrying auxiliary equipment like the ground sonar? It’s hilarious.

Helena: The most experienced of the current pilots, and the only one prior to their formation that had seen actual combat. Helena’s not too quick to trust Alma, Noisy Fairy’s team leader, but she also wasn’t too miffed about the appointment itself. Once Alma proves herself, Helena moves on to ‘other’ matters that could use some work, like Alma’s conduct outside of battle. Honestly I think Alma riding the Gallop like a giant turtle was adorable. Anyway, while Helena’s normally all business, she’s usually got some good commentary to go along with whatever’s happening. She’s also a great shot. Just stay out of her line of fire. You’ve been warned.

Killy: She’s a gentle but strong presence in Noisy Fairy, always ready to bear the burden of any questionable actions the fairies have to take in battle. I get the feeling she’s a true Zeon, and by that I mean someone who genuinely believes in Zeon’s cause and hopes the Zabi family can bring it all to fruition. She’s also the most interesting character to me so far because not only did she used to be a pilot herself, but that past is having a huge effect on how she views Alma, Mia, and Helena. She’s not just trying to make sure she trains them well enough to survive the war, but she’s thinking very long term, if only vaguely. She’s a big sister type in the foreground, giving lots of leeway and guidance, and a battle mom in the background, making sure everything runs smoothly.

I’ll find some time to go through Volume 3 next week and do a follow up to this post. As for my overall first impressions? Pretty good. I hope they keep coming out with more content for Code Fairy.

Seriously, come on.

A special thanks to Sunday, the best day of the week for all things random.

A Heinrich Rebuild Coming Soon

by Phoenix | Nov 6, 2021 | Space Engineers

Nothing noteworthy was finished in time for today’s post, but tomorrow’s a Sunday and that’s always got potential.

A while back I posted some pictures of the Prinz Heinrich (inspired by the one-off cruiser, not the battleship from WoWs) and it was coming along nicely. Since it was based on the D-37 Timberwolf, the interior was already a solid design. I never dared to change it too much until recently. While I was updating the ventral section, something finally snapped and I decided to strip out the ship’s interior entirely and try to see if I could improve it. Now it’s not something I would consider an improvement over the vanilla version of the Timberwolf, but it’s surprisingly roomy by comparison. The only reason I attempted this was because of a passage ways mod that has both open and enclosed block types. It’s perfect for maximizing the interior space of a ship while hiding most conveyors.

Something else snapped while I was redoing the interior of the ship and I wound up adding a larger super structure, stripping all the weapons, redesigning entire parts of the hull, particularly the bow section, and I referenced one of the Halo ships on the Space Engineers workshop to experiment with some subgrids. I rarely have any luck trying to incorporate subgrids, but lately hinges have been surprisingly reliable and stable. I won’t touch piston bases for any reason, not even to make an spacecraft catapult, but the hinges are fine, rotors are good if used sparingly, and piston heads make good decoration. The only rotor in use right now is for a combination search unit (sensor, spotlight, and camera).

The hinges being used have extra armor attached to them. The ship’s a bit heavier than it should be but I’ll make a sweep sometime and cut back on parts where I need to. Greeble can sometimes help with that. Normally the hinged parts are fixed but there are two sets in the back that are designed to fold and rotate to put the armored wings in different configurations. It looks really nice, but it’s also kind of insane for one of my builds. The term ‘unique armored cruiser’ fits Heinrich perfectly now.

I’ll try to find the time to finish up the major changes so I can put up a guided tour video along with some screenshots. There’s also a new Cosmo Messer variant (a scout) that comes with it. The Heinrich can carry two of them, one internally and one near the stern.

That’s all until tomorrow.

Fleeing Victory #7

by Phoenix | Nov 5, 2021 | FV, Pinned, Short Stories

Fire and Fury

All Fran knew for certain was that one of the draques was standing over her and bracing against the incoming gunfire. She could feel the bullets ricocheting off her protector’s head and wings. The intense flash left Fran seeing nothing but white, but even as her sight slowly returned, she couldn’t make out anything clearly. Worse, her ears were still ringing, almost drowning out the panging of bullets and the draques’ shrill hissing. Fran couldn’t even steady herself, not even while down on all fours. Whether it was a stun grenade or some Calig equivalent, it must have gone off right next to her.

Just how many of them were there anyway?

Suddenly the gunfire stopped. Fran’s ears slowly stopped ringing and the sound of artillery fire, allies calling out to each other, and Fort Baldi’s sirens became louder and clearer. “What a mess,” Fran groaned, crawling out from under the quick thinking draque.

Perspicaz was her savior. He lowered his wings to inspect the damage while Fran, still dazed and off balance, tried to look around. No one was near the containers where they confronted the first of Calig’s ghosts. Fran and her three draques were alone for the moment. They were anything but safe, however.

“How is it?”

Perspicaz tilted its head back and forth, assessing the nicks and scratches in the dark as best it could. From what Fran could tell, he was fine. At the very least, he could continue the mission. They were going to need backup, though. Calig special forces were far more than a scout and a trio of flying automata could handle. Fran had to warn her sister and the others.

One radio call after another saw Valencia and the rest of Jinete warned about the Calig commandos. Fran also learned that the situation in the northeastern corner of Fort Baldi had deteriorated rapidly since her search began. Several heavy arma had directly breached the wall and brought a few squads of automata foot soldiers with them. Fran wasn’t given a choice on the matter; Valencia ordered her to join the defense and leave the ghost matter for later. The risk was great, but it was a calculated one, as Fran was already incapacitated once. She didn’t have the experience or the firepower to beat Calig’s best at night, and while under the threat of indiscriminate artillery fire. They were here for something else, Cordoba, Fran suspected. That was why they didn’t press their advantage and kill her. If she and her sister was fast enough, if they could repel the Cordaeans, then they could turn their full attention to protecting the Cordoba. The plan couldn’t be get any more straightforward, so Fran mounted up and led the draques toward the breach.

Fran soon arrived at the breach, and what she saw infuriated her. The first heavy arma was well inside Fort Baldi, laying waste to the top floor of the command center with high explosive shells. It was covered in black splashes from where rockets had struck but failed to penetrate, and its two heavy machineguns were partially melted from the battle. The arma was surrounded on all sides by automata armed with rifles and grenades. Every Munican soldier bold enough to try and ordnance at the heavy tank was quickly suppressed by the mechanical soldiers. The ones who hadn’t taken cover fast enough, and the ones who were caught out in the open when the wall was first breached, all lay dead and strewn around the battlefield. Several draque units were disabled and being used as cover by the garrison.

Fran couldn’t keep staring at what was left of the command center. Her sister might have still been in there, and just the thought of Valencia dying in a surprise attack, barely able to coordinate the battle or fight the enemy herself, it was just unbearable. For now, she had her orders: Help defend Fort Baldi. Fran wasn’t sure she could contribute much to this lopsided siege, but she was going to try.

The automata saw Fran and the draques coming and forced to scatter in all directions with a hail of bullets. That was when the second arma came lumbering through the breach in the northeast wall. It immediately fired a round from its main gun into the HQ building, striking the second floor and sending concrete and dust spewing out. Fran evaded the automatons while Perspicaz and the other draques began charging up the haze guns hidden in their jaws. Just as the second arma’s heavy machineguns began to track her, Fran pulled back on Perspicaz’s control sticks and brought them both into a hard turn. The draque released all of the energy it had stored up in one concentrated beam of energy, sweeping across the arma’s flank and melting the automatons that had just joined the battle.

The other two draques fired their haze guns at the heavy arma’s machineguns, causing their magazines to explode. They had followed standard procedure to the letter, taking out the heavy machineguns first since the main guns couldn’t track them in such a close in fight. With those taken out, the only protection the armas had were the soldier drones they brought with them. The second arma began to move backward in retreat, but soon realized its mistake and drove away from the breach and toward cover, leaving the hole wide open for the next arma to come through.

“We can’t take them down fast enough,” Fran grimaced. She could strip away some of their weapons at most on her own, but the draques were light aerial automatons. They couldn’t deal with heavy armor, and certainly not Cordaean heavy armor. They needed much more firepower to destroy or disarm the arma.

“Fran get back,” Valencia ordered. Her voice came over the radio, reverberating as if she was surrounded by metal.

Fran and the three draques heard something coming from above. They looked up just in time to see an enormous draque come diving down. Valencia was inside, guiding the assault draque toward the first arma. Fran knew what would happen next, and ordered the draques to get clear. Even the soldiers were running to gain distance as Valencia’s draque opened the bomb bays on its abdomen and revealed several large bombs. One of them detached as soon as the bay opened up, and Valencia pulled her draque out of the nosedive. A few seconds later, the first arma was blown apart. The Munican soldiers had gotten clear in time, but the arma’s automaton escorts were caught in the blast before they noticed the danger. The entire area was covered in dust and black smoke.

“I’m glad you’re alright, Valencia,” Fran said into her radio.

“We’ve lost good people here. I won’t be joining them, but I will avenge them. Fran, run interference.”

Just like always, Fran thought, appreciating the sudden turn of events more than she could put into words. “I’m on it.”

The Munican assault draque, Jubilosa landed on the wall and opened her jaws, exposing a massive haze gun. The barrel extended out of the draque’s mouth and released a violent burst of mana against a group of arma gathering just outside Fort Baldi. The return fire from the automatons and heavy machineguns barely amounted to glancing hits and scratches. As Jubilosa turned, she swept the field, slagging the automatons and forcing the armas to fall back far enough to use their main guns. By the time the farthest arma could raise its gun high enough, Valencia stopped the attack and took to the night sky.

The Cordaean advance was halted for the moment, which meant they just had the heavy arma already inside to deal with. With no infantry support, the Munican defenders were able to come back with a vengeance. As they readied an entire volley of armor piercing rockets for the second breaching arma, a third hurried through the breach in the wall. The Municans decided to focus on it first, sending seven rockets past the husk of the first arma. The automatons were shattered by the blasts almost as soon as they leaped into action. The third arma fired one shot at the garrison and then started to back out through the breach.

The second arma tried to take advantage of the reprieve by leveling its main gun at the rocket bearers. Now it was time to run interference. Fran flew Perspicaz toward the remaining arma, attempting to flank it while the other draques chased the third. She made it just in time, slamming Perspicaz and herself into the barrel, throwing the shot completely off target. The second arma’s arms deployed in response, trying to grab them. Unlike the light armas, Cordaea’s heavy tanks had four arms at their disposal. Perspicaz couldn’t get clear in time, and was jerked down by the tail. The arm on the opposing side took the draque by the crown and held them down over the barrel of its main gun. Then the two remaining arms in the back started beating Perspicaz’s body over and over. Fran didn’t know how to save them both from the arma.

“Hang on! Just hang on,” Fran pleaded, leaping from the damaged draque onto the top of the turret. She had no way of breaking in and taking out the crew, and she had only seconds before the rear arms were turned on her. She wouldn’t fare nearly as well as Perspicaz if she was caught the same way. Instead of going after the crew, Fran decided to keep moving and jump down to the back of the arma. She didn’t find anything unsecure enough to force open and damage with just her pistol, certainly not with the time she had. The rear arms were after her almost as soon as she hopped onto the back of the arma. That gave Perspicaz time to fight back, which it did by blasting the arma’s right wrist with the haze gun, the same one holding its head down.

Fran barely avoided being crushed as she dove clear of the arma’s reach. Then she saw the rest of Jinete coming. Not just the two draques she brought with her, Lazo, Flora, and everyone else were almost on top of them.

“Ready concentrated burst,” Lazo shouted. The draques surrounded the heavy arma while Flora approached to help Perspicaz.

That was enough interference, Fran thought, running for cover as all of Jinete’s draque’s mouths began to glow a bright blue-green with burning hot mana.

Perspicaz spent most of its energy melting off the arma’s grasping claw with its own haze gun, and when Flora arrived, her draque used its claws to rip Perspicaz free. They both flew away as fast as they could. The arma managed to raise its gun toward Lazo and fired a shot. The shot narrowly missed him.

“FIRE!!!”

The arma was struck by over a dozen beams of light from all directions as the survivors got away. The heavy arma’s armor was thicker than anyone could have imagined, but Lazo ordered the attack to continue. The armor could only use its shields to guard in four directions, and the draques kept the assault up while moving to overwhelm it.

“Keep it up!” Lazo began to worry as his own draque’s energy reserves began to run low. Several others depleted themselves entirely and fell to the ground, weakening the barrage.

The Arma’s turret was still in tact, but turning more slowly as it struggled against the heat. It was trying to acquire Lazo one more time, but he drifted out of the way before the arma could open fire. Slowly but surely, the arma’s drive system was reduced to slag, its treads glowed a bright orange, metal began to drip from its armor plates under the withering barrage. The arma’s crew were surely dead by now, and only the arma itself was fighting back. Finally, the arma gave up on shooting Lazo and turned its turret around to attack Fran, the only one left the turret could reach.

Fran tried to take cover behind one of the downed draques, but she knew that wouldn’t save her if an arma round came her way.

“Just die,” Lazo bellowed in desperation.

The half melted arma didn’t hesitate. As soon as it had Fran lined up with its gun, it tried to take one last defiant shot, and fire and dust erupted from behind its treads and out from the turret ring as the whole thing went up in flames. The turret was blown away, sailing through the air as fire rained down all around them.

“We did it.”

As she came out from behind the disabled draque, Fran knew it wasn’t over. Not only did the Cordaeans have air power in the area, but the Calmens were sneaking around somewhere. She had only laid eyes on one of the unlucky ones. There was no telling how many of them there were, or what kind of damage they could inflict in the middle of all this chaos.

Moral Hazard Video and Opportunity Cost

by Phoenix | Nov 4, 2021 | Blog, Economics, Life, Media, Writing, Youtube

I haven’t shared any videos on the blog in a long time but this particular episode of Out of Frame really resonated with me.

The video also reminded me of some of my own antics. Taking the seat next to moral hazard is opportunity cost.

The blog’s been quiet and peaceful, something I’ve enjoyed for a long time. It’s helped me build up self-discipline. The peace and quiet and ‘safety’ has also set me back in some areas. At some point, all of this gets interrupted. It has to in order for me to move forward. The floodgates will open–or the dam will just break–and I’ll have to take on a whole lot more than I could have ever imagined just a few years ago.

It’s chaos, so I know I’m going to be making a lot of mistakes along the way navigating the love and the cruelty of the audience.

Not going out of my way to bring people to the Praedian Records when it first started could have been a mistake. It was definitely one opportunity traded for another. I wanted to get comfortable with things and establish what I do first. It was important to prove to myself that I could handle the silence as well as the din and not peter out. I can work with and without feedback, so I know for a fact that I can keep going. No one told me I could, I just showed that to myself.

I think about how much more motivated I could be, too. When I was first starting out, it was insanely difficult to post here at all. Writing out of character, and to no one in particular, is one of my weakest areas. If I was engaging people, things would have been a lot more exciting, frustrating, interesting, and annoying, all at the same time. I know I’d be a lot further along in certain areas, though probably not in others.

Another example of opportunity cost: What if I’d found an artist to render some of ZAP’s more prominent characters, or maybe even all of them? What if I’d taken less time to write and honed my own drawing skills more? I might not need a dedicated artist other than myself in that case. For now it’s all just text and reference materials I made years and years ago. It’s not a steep cost by itself, but it’s still there.

There were a myriad of different ways I could have handled things. I wonder how each phase of what I’m doing is going to transition into the next. As quiet as the site is right now, it’s already a little chaotic, and I’m always tripping over the edge of my comfort zone.

That leads to the actual feedback and the challenges. I’ll go ahead and confirm that the Praedian Records does receive visitors, and not just spam bots. Comments are exceedingly rare, but like I said, the blog’s been quiet and peaceful. It’s not always going to be that way, though. That’s good, but I know what comes with it.

With every bit of constructive criticism or general approval comes the harsh and vague critique, the random accusations, ridicule for not liking or knowing much about this that or the other thing, politics, sabotage. You know, the good ol’ internet drama that follows and harries us all. The more progress you make, and the more success you earn, the worse that will get. If it doesn’t, then I’d suspect I was going backwards and course correct. Either way I don’t take it lightly. Even the negative feedback is important, but it can get you wildly off track if you’re not disciplined enough to handle it.

I’m in no hurry to get to that point, but it’s coming. A part of me doesn’t want to give up the relaxing days of chipping away at stories, slowly building up a catalogue of content while honing my skills, but I see the cracks in the dam … and look at all that text. You can tell when something’s bothering me because the words just keep coming.

That’s enough of that for one day, but this is definitely going to come up again in the near future. I hope you enjoyed the video and found this post in general useful or interesting.

Approaching the Beginning (Fleeing Victory)

by Phoenix | Nov 4, 2021 | FV, Writing

Fleeing Victory #7 should be done by tomorrow since I’m making good progress on it, but I want to go ahead and confirm something I’ve been considering for a while now.

If you’re not interested in the plotting details for Fleeing Victory, you can go ahead and skip the rest of this post. There are no real spoilers below, but there will be fewer surprises if you read it, so fair warning.

I’ve decided to weave the military cast of characters (at the very least) together through a string of conflicts until we come just about full circle. By that point, we’ll reach the ‘in medias res’ point that the story was originally going to start from. The story’s called Fleeing Victory, and people do an awful lot of running away, but it’s really about desertion in the line of duty, for better or for worse.

I had every intention of starting with that, but then I actually got to writing and wanted to cover a whole lot more, so I will.

So for an extremely quick rundown:

Introduce the military portion of the cast through a string of battles and skirmishes.
Introduce and reintroduce the protagonists afterward.
Onward to the results of their actions.

All this is in practice is a really long prologue. The real challenge with Fleeing Victory is weaving everyone’s stories together after the bigger conflict starts. I have not tried something like this before, so I can only give it the old fashioned try and see how things turn out.

The Praedian Records

J.G. Phoenix