Enderal first time, impressions

[dyslexicfaser]

- It’s a little odd, but according to my map marker I’m supposed to report Lishari’s death to Lexil the Archmage. He’s posed pretty fabulously when I find him, leafing through an ancient tome. #JustArchmageThings.

He has a few kind words for Lishari, but honestly the whole thing feels weirdly understated. They’re kicking the investigation over to ‘Commander Eren’, who I don’t think I’ve ever met or heard of. Not exactly bringing their A-game to the investigation, is what I’m saying.
Lexil and Tealor Arantheal have much more to say about the Beacon than about their ally found stabbed to death in her room. See, it’s got three spots for power to be plugged in. I just knew I was going to have to Legend of Zelda this shit up at some point. I could feel it.
Hey Prophetess, you ever heard of the ‘black stones’?



What kind of undesirable side-effects? Wait, don’t tell me, I can guess.



I said I can guess!
Always, it comes back to insanity and death.
On the upside, good thematic callback to me burning my house down and murdering the fam in a fit of insanity. If I have to go back to my home in Nehrim to get one of your Beacon gizmos, Lexil …
Well honestly, that would be pretty cool. Yeah. I’m down. Who wouldn’t want to sift through the destroyed remnants of their childhood home looking for a shiny ball that’ll probably drive them mad with power, and might have done once already?

- Also:



Elia. Elia, can I … help you?
… No? Not gonna say a word. Just gonna … chill? Okay, cool. You do you, girl.

- Unfortunately, I prooobably shouldn’t have put this meeting off to do Fortress Fogwatch, because Lexil tells me he’s got some things to get together, and to come back tomorrow. So I’m stuck cooling my heels.

- Well, I’ve got a quest from the ‘A GOD AM I’ inventor guy, to go find his wayward apprentice, anyway. So I’m off to a new area called ‘Wellwatch’.



Why is this game so beautiful, holy shit. I mean, I’m not sure how the seasons work in Enderal, but SureAI sure can make some evocative scenery.

- On the way to the campsite where what’s-her-face was dragged off, I run into a bandit camp-slash-quarry that got murdered but good by some… wood elementals or something? Spriggans? Very large dryad type things surrounded by a cloud of stinging flies, named <Goldenforst Matriarchs>.
Whatever, they’re not ‘ard enough to deal with flame-wolf. Bit of a mismatch, there. Right? Fire, meet tree. You already have so much in common; like being on fire.
… Is that supposed to be ‘Goldenforest’, by the way? Just asking.
More importantly, I wander into an innocuous cave attached to the quarry called ‘Cliff Diving Grotto’, and run into a new type of undead. Lost Ones, clad in black and silver armor and wielding bows of similar make.
This is gonna be one of those dungeons.

- Or it would be, except the pathing is REALLY bad, in here. As long as I cower behind this rock and fire about 50 arrows downrange, the two Lost Ones at the entrance just run back and forth and I can take my time and bring them down like one of those carnival shooting gallery games with the cork guns.
The next, a batch of four, are likewise not much of a challenge. I’m not sure if it’s the speed they run at or more bad pathing, but none of them even get close. My wolf doesn’t even deploy, just hangs around doing his best to foul my shots.
Down, then up, and then… Markul Darkhand, kin to my friend from the Madness Time beneath Ark. This one has a pretty nasty fire and ice combination attack: an AOE freezing mist that keeps the enemy from moving at more than a crawl, and then a fireball as a finisher.
That just means my wolf runs in ahead of me as I cower like the coward I am, and tears the poor lich open like a turkey.
This wolf, man. Somebody was talking earlier about who I might be romancing, Jespar or Calia? I’m mostly wondering at this point just how restrictive the local laws are. I mean, what a hero and her elemental wolf get up to behind closed doors is nobody’s business but theirs, right?

- There’s a few more Lost Ones between me and the exit, but I sail right on through to find this guy:



Am I weird for finding him adorable? With his little lantern and sword and skeleton grin?
Just me? Okay then.

- Off to find Pathira, then. There’s a mysterious blood splatter at her camp, so… I’m guessing she’s not off picking flowers. The minimap marker clicks off; it’s time to do some detective work.
Except we appear to be close enough to aggro a Goldenforst Matriarch. No sweat, right? Except during the fight, something goes wrong.
Something about the mob (charm spells?), or a bug, or something... I am beset by base treachery.



Elemental wolf bites hurt a lot.

- That happens twice, actually, and I just barely manage to kill the Matriarch and wolfie with a sliver of health left on the second go-round. I see how it is.
Well, y’know what, wolfie? I don’t even NEED you! I have this hideous thing!



I can barely stand to look at it, but it’s level 30 to your 26, and it’s probably got like, magic and shit. I’m gonna take it on magical adventures in the Goldenforst, and learn valuable lessons and maybe doom all humanity to living under the mighty bootheel of a new Centurion God-king! And it’ll be awesome!
So there. *sniff*


The Takeaway:
I have to say, the Order’s response to Constantine and Lishari’s death is not comforting in the least. After all, I’m a suspicious foreigner, too, y’know? If I died on one of these little jaunts (y’know, for real) (like, permanently) I wonder if the Keepers clustered around that table in the Sun Temple would shake their heads and murmur ‘sad’ before moving on to other business?
Luckily, they can’t get rid of me that easily.

[badgesareus]

Your last pic is rather interesting. I've used the oorbaya, but I never took a close look at it, as I was usually busy not dying. It looks like it has a giant heart; isn't that a bit exposed? Looks like a combo of too much arcane fever with too many protein shakes.

edit: I do hope you will continue this side quest all the way to its end; I'm sure your impressions will be quite interesting!

[dyslexicfaser]

Your last pic is rather interesting. I've used the oorbaya, but I never took a close look at it, as I was usually busy not dying. It looks like it has a giant heart; isn't that a bit exposed? Looks like a combo of too much arcane fever with too many protein shakes.

edit: I do hope you will continue this side quest all the way to its end; I'm sure your impressions will be quite interesting!

It looks like a heart but I'm kind of assuming it's some kind of... tumor or... a sac filled with blood or some other horrifying fluid, or something?

Absolutely disgusting, whatever it is. And a little like you're supposed to hit its glowing weak point for massive damage like a Legend of Zelda puzzle boss.

I'm frankly glad the SureAI team couldn't find a disgusting enough idle noise for it to make; it just roars during combat. The wolf was bad enough; it howls from time to time, and I always spin around expecting to get teeth buried in my throat like usual.

[Buccaneer]

Admittedly as much as I love her, Lishari was a thorn in the side to the powers-that-be, mouthing off in her inimitable way.

As far as being a coward, I'm happy for those chances. It can't be hard all of the time, can it?

[R'Q]

The region is almost always named "Goldenforst". I came upon a few instances of "Golden Forest" and I think one "Goldenfrost".

Well I wonder what's the story behind this name, because Goldenforst makes no sense (?) while Golden Forest does. Nevertheless it's in fact a golden forest.

[Buccaneer]

R'Q, I think it was a little lost in translation from the original German. There are a few other words like that popping up.

[Kermit 61]

@R´Q You can report such things in the bugtracker. The exact place would be important.
Sometimes a screenshot is helpful.

[badgesareus]

I think it was a little lost in translation from the original German

It wasn't exactly lost in translation, it just wasn't translated at all in many instances, as "forst" is one of the German words for "forest." (according to google translate, which is never wrong.)

[Buccaneer]

I think it was a little lost in translation from the original German

It wasn't exactly lost in translation, it just wasn't translated at all in many instances, as "forst" is one of the German words for "forest." (according to google translate, which is never wrong.)

I know, I guess what I meant was that the game (dialog, text, etc.) was translated from the original German to English - not quite 100% though as Kermit alluded to.

[dyslexicfaser]

- So there we are, following a blood trail for a couple hundred feet that obviously contains more blood than anybody should have inside them.
I’m thinking to myself there’s no way this lady is still alive.
The trail takes us up some wooden palisade type structure, with cannons on it. With bandits in it, of course! I hope the bandits will resist the invading Nehrimese for us, since they control all of Enderal’s mines and quarries and, apparently, our defensive structures too.
Well, maybe they would have if I hadn’t just filled them full of magic arrows.



- I’m not sure why entering some dungeons alerts everyone in the first room, leading to my swift beatdown when my summoned critter doesn’t come through the door with me, and sometimes lets me get the drop on them instead. Maybe that’s intentional?
This is one of the former, so I immediately run outside and begin a fighting retreat back down the structure until the bandits are dead. The first room is actually a huge cavern-type room built into what must be the mountain, with bedrolls and tables filled with clutter and huge kegs of what I assume are alcohol. Aside from a watchtower type structure inside the cavern which doesn’t make any goddamn sense, it’s pretty homey. At least up here, anyway; downstairs is a supply room, and a whole lotta jail cells and bear traps everywhere.

- The Oorbaya does a pitiful fraction of the physical damage my wolf does (which is odd given it’s like 8 feet tall with arms like bloody tree trunks), but it’s pretty sturdy and periodically explodes in a huge purple wave of energy that looks like it hits the entire room. Including myself, although thankfully there’s no damage to go along with the nausea-inducing energy backwash.
It also sounds like a cannon going off, which turns out to be a downside when it aggros every bandit in the place down on our heads.
I’m probably going to be forgiving the elemental wolf pretty quickly if the alternative is ‘fight the entire dungeon simultaneously.’

- Also, the starling lady I came here to find, Pahtira, is actually fine! In a cage, but fine.
She tells me she’s hurt, but she’s not, you know, covered in blood or anything.
It sure is convenient that the blood trail which didn’t actually come from my quarry still led me right to her, but whatever. Maybe the bandits regularly drag prey (human or animal) back to the fort…? I don’t know.

- Pahtira sends me on another fetch quest to get that steering unit to complete the Centurion. It’s apparently located inside yet another old fortress for some reason (that’s been taken over by bandits, of course). Are these bandits raiding Pyrean ruins and making off with the goods?
… It would be pretty cool to see a bandit faction in Dwemer-type gear.

- There are three Vatyr roaming around outside the fort. Been a while since I met any of those, but I definitely don’t remember them moving this quick! It takes these guys about two or three seconds to run from bow range into face-stabbing range.
Then I reload and make sure to put my minion between us properly this time.
I found the Vatyr to be much more dangerous than the bandits inside the fort, leading me to assume that the bandits have been trapped in there for days while the Vatyr prowl around below.
I mean, this guy had his own name, so presumably he was supposed to be some kind of bandit king...



But mostly I’m just impressed with how prettily he burns.
This works so much better when wolfie stays pointed in the right direction.

- So I grab the macguffin and head back to Ark, where of course I find the ‘heavily injured’ Pahtira beat me home. I bet she just didn’t want to assault a fortress manned by bandits after wading through Vatyr, the wimp.
I’m not sure what’s going on between Pahtira and Yerai (that’s the inventor guy), except that Yerai is his passive-aggressive self while Pahtira is coming off very snippy. They do not have a good working relationship, these two.



Look at how sassy she looks! It’s all hands-on-hips and crossed-arms, with her.
I also really like her outfit, with the big stompy Dwemer-type boots and gauntlets. This feels like a lady who does a lot of tromping around and sticking her hands into dangerous places, and needs protection to make sure she’s not pulling back a bloody stump.

- Speaking of dangerous things likely to result in dismemberment, they want me to go a starling spaceship that apparently crash landed here in Enderal, in a glacier. Now that the robot’s chassis is finished they still need a power source to run it.
Pahtira’s tagging along to help with… something or other, but she mentions casually that there’s likely to be an array of traps to turn intruders into dust, bones, or puddles of flesh.
Starling traps apparently come in ‘death’, ‘vaporization’ and ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ varieties.


The Takeaway:
Now, that’s pretty cool (spaceship!), but at this point I kind of want to apotheosize into the golden robot if they’re gonna make me save their lives, finish the chassis and find a power core.
Well, the main quest has ticked over to a new day now, but I figure I might as well finish up this quest line first.
Onward to Agnod!