Thanks for leaving your thoughts. As far as the bugs, like I admit in the OP, the game is in kind of bad shape, and I’m most likely going to have to extract the script and maps and rebuild from scratch. As far as supply stalling the game, that only ever happened to me if I tried to go back into supply a second time while managing capture inventory. But I could withdraw from the supply in Chapter 5. Elthunder was working the last time it was used during my testing, so I’m sorry the game got out like that. But I kind of wanted to get some opinions before I went making a bunch more chapters. And I wanted to know if having three parties going at once would be discombobulating.
Units
-Myrmidons having innate crit was one of the things I wanted feedback on. One of the reasons Myrmidons always feel kind of underpowered is they’re supposed to be built around getting crits, but in reality, they don’t actually crit any better than anything else before promotion. I also gave the Mercenary class higher strength and defense but lowered its speed and skill to have less overlap between the two. But in general, I wanted to encourage approaching units with crit with higher defense or using Poseidon’s Barrier in the case of magic enemies. Also, I know not everyone seems to like the way I balance around passive buff skills, but Clarabel grants Crit Avoid to adjacent allies. I’m not sure what you were getting at in regards to Martha when you talk about crit and Myrmidons because she doesn’t have an innate crit bonus.
-While I know it’s hard to say because they’re only playable on two maps, my experience with Adam and Eve is a bit different from what you describe. Adam doesn’t double much, but he at least had fairly high single hit output and could take many hits with a Barrier on him. In Chapter 4, I consistently felt like I needed everyone, and he could work fairly autonomously compared to others. Eve isn’t really meant to be that great offensively because of her utility as a mounted staff user, and she starts with enough rank to use things like Torch and Restore. But she can fight in a pinch.
-As far as mages. Theo is meant to be a nuke, but he dies very easily. Several enemies in Chapter 4 can even double him. Leticia is meant to be much stronger than those around her.
-I kind of expect Phineas to feel much weaker going forward, especially in maps less heavy with axe users. I gave him Swordfaire to even out his stat spread being split between strength and magic, but I don’t expect it to carry him forever given his growths.
Maps
-I think I might make Chapter 4 last more turns as it still feels like the chapter is still going when it ends. I guess I wasn’t sure how players would feel about a nine or ten turn defense map that early on.
-In Chapter 5, I had already changed it so that Clarabel reveals an entrance to the boss room as originally she revealed a door, but it caused way too much waiting around for Annie. But I’ll think about redesigning the jail cell as well.
-For the book chapter, I admit that Barrier is the only PRF that factors into the battle, but I don’t really find there are enough enemies for it to feel awkwardly paced. Each party member can one shot one type of book, though Adam needs his HP topped off to activate his skill. Sid can one shot any book with his Silver Sword. Adam can one shot Fire and Wind Tomes, and Eve can one shot Wind Tomes. The characters are even vaguely color coded as to what they can kill.
Prep screen is planned to start from Chapter 6. You don’t have the prep screen in any of the playable chapters because the player is unlikely to have anything beyond starting equipment.
Story
-The point of the ending scene in Chapter 5 isn’t what you took from it. Not saying that isn’t my fault, but it’s not about Milton being different from other nobles. Firstly, remember that Milton is not a “noble.” He’s an elected official. Several of his scenes are about how he has to stay in the good graces of influential people to maintain his position. Which is why he reminisces about his expectations from his university days after everything goes down at the end of the chapter. The subtext written into pretty much every Milton scene is that he’s not meeting his own expectations because of the way he has to behave in order to maintain the position that will supposedly allow him to make a difference. And Annie’s reasons for blowing up at Milton more complicated than what’s on the surface. “Why do you have to be this way?” is fairly open to interpretation. Maybe it feels final because the demo ends there, but her feelings are more complicated than what you describe.
-As far as missing supports due to benching, a lot of the game will be full deploy because of the different parties.
-The church where Georgette serves plays a significant role in the opening act of the game. But the implication is that there was a massive cultural exchange between Judgral and Celesia because of Cosette and Orville (this is why Tomes and Staves exist in Celesia now), and Jugdral’s pantheon of dragon gods have taken root because of the vacuum of Celesia’s church collapsing in Deity Device. There’s not much to it other than there are twelve dragons revered as benevolent deities, and the Church was created by Bragi of the twelve crusaders who is revered in a manner similar to Saint Elimine in the Elibe games. But the symbol around Georgette’s neck is from the Heim scroll, and Kyle (the captain of the guard at the church) has the symbol from the Bragi scroll on his coat collar. Maybe things feel half assed because the story essentially at the prologue stage six chapters in due to it being structured around concurrent happenings. Perhaps it might not feel that way if this release went on longer.
