Bethany Plays: RD Chapter 1-1: Unfair Play

...Wait a second... the ending narration to Path of Radiance implied that that cutscene occurred in the spring of the year 646. Is... is the three year timeskip counting from the start of Path of Radiance? Great, now I've gotten math involved. Also seasons. Daein is in the north, I assume Tellius is a northern hemisphere continent? I can't do northern hemisphere seasons.

These opening narrations are now fully voice acted, and thus automatically proceed. Crimea is actually supposed to be highlighted, but this fact took me by surprise.

I'm not sure "abdicate" is the correct word, but yeah, basically, Crimea passed on ruling Daein after winning the war against it, and without its own sovereign, Daein was absorbed into Begnion.

And this is why all the men are absent from the villages. For the most part. They missed a few, or perhaps "fighting age" is defined differently to me.

"Did you ever notice the wheel isn't attached to anything?"

...Is no one allowed to work the fields, or is Begnion salting the earth? I feel like by now, the women and elderly should've at least tried to take over farming. Maybe it's some kind of seed shortage.

The harrowing quest to accomplish this never made it into the game. Edward is an orphan who trained in swordplay in the hopes of getting an Ashnard promotion before the whole "Ashnard lost" thing. Leonardo is a noble's son whose family was killed in the Mad King's War and he was chased from his military academy when Begnion took over. Nolan was a former merchant whose trusted coworker bankrupted him overnight and reduced him to a street rat- this was well before the Mad King's War, but his only reaction to that was a passive "meh".

There is nobody left for Daein. Except us.

...Nobody tell them it was me who led the Crimeans to victory and caused this.

"Said to", and does. While Nolan is technically the leader and does all the dirty work, Micaiah is also the heart of the team and pretty much in charge of the team's direction.

And the people of Daein recognise that, labelling her as their oncoming saviour. The magic powers probably help them come to that conclusion.

And, in failing to do so, have only emboldened the Daein people's belief.

It is incredibly difficult to pull the wool over the eyes of someone with the ability to see the future.

"Micaiah is revered" will continue to be a theme of this chapter, apparently.

Not pictured: a roof.

After that opening narration, we see Micaiah worrying she's about to get a scolding.

If we didn't help, what kind of saviours would we be?

Being spotted by Begnion is apparently a huge obstacle for us.

I mocked Lucia for instantly declaring Geoffrey dead as soon as Daein found him, but now we're actually a member of La Resistance, it's not that huge of a logical leap.

Edward is still not really 'over' this whole mess.

Yeah... yeah. There's not that much you can really say in good faith when, if you played Path of Radiance, you are responsible for this mess.

I wonder how much of this was Crimea's need to rebuild and how much of this was Ike giving Zelgius responsibility over Daein while he went to go win the war back home.

Crimea could never have taken over Daein even if it wanted to. It was barely able to rebuild itself as is. I wonder, if Elincia petitioned Sanaki, if Crimea could press its claim and take it when it is in a better position.

Sothe and Nolan are back from wherever they went.

Sothe has grown a lot from Path of Radiance. The exposed midriff is, by the developer's admission, intended to portray that he hasn't changed clothes over the timeskip. I won't be showing off all the timeskip designs (some of them don't even feel like differences), but I will show off all the girls and interesting redesigns.

Also, since Sothe is an example, someone on the Radiant Dawn design team seemed to hate portraits where the body faced away from the front (both Sothes are facing the same way). All Radiant Dawn portraits have both head and body facing the front- although it seems Anna got skipped. I haven't shown Anna in this blog at all (she narrates the optional, higher-detail tutorials), which is probably the reason why.

They got held up.

By Begnion patrols.

Shares a nervous glance.

Cut to black to explain everything.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA...

But seriously, from the looks of things, the extended cut of the script cuts this mention of Sacrifice from the story. If you're playing "correctly", it might be a sensible idea to use Sacrifice on Edward to maintain his momentum, but it is still not necessarily something the player is forced to do.

This is just an excuse to exposit about the nature of Micaiah's Sacrifice skill. It will be plot-relevant later.

As if her silver hair doesn't do it already.

Sothe declares this hideout a lost cause and suggests a breakout.

And all Nolan wanted was lunch.

"An alley in Nevassa." Accurate, there presumably isn't anything better, but still funny.

Micaiah sighs and puts away her cat ears.

Basically, "everywhere else is worse".

There are indeed reinforcements from the starting position in Normal mode. There's a surprising amount of gameplay/story integration in Normal mode that just isn't in Easy.

For example, in Normal mode, this is an Escape victory condition, with two Escape tiles here. And in fact, you must escape within ten turns. The Escape victory condition is unused in Easy mode, and there's also no time limit for us.

There's a lot more exposition about battle strategy here. I'd mostly be laughing at it anyway, so >>.

And the map starts immediately.

We only have to worry about 5 of them moving towards us. Again, "Easy", but still...

This is as far as Micaiah goes.

"I suppose you may as well be the Dawn Brigade..."

You really don't have to.

Another one of these. Imagine if a house gave you one in PoR.

Boss banter for the enemy's first turn.

Mercenary:
イサイヤ隊長っ！
【暁の団】とおぼしき連中が
姿を現しました！！

Isaiya:
そうか、やはり…
おれの読みどおりだったな。

Mercenary:
警備を手薄にしておけば、
必ずここを選んでやってくる……
まさに、その通りで。

Isaiya:
ここできっちり仕留めて、
帝国の奴らにおれたちの
腕を売り込んでおかんとな。
…決して逃がしてはならんぞ！

Mercenary:
わかっております！

From the sounds of it, there's apparently an implication that Isaiya intentionally made the guard lightest here to get the Dawn Brigade to appear and claim this glory in JP, either through a script extension or just plain old translation differences.

Meanwhile, Micaiah is challenging this guy, and worrying about her HP situation.

Especially since she took the hit. She has to kill this guy- if anyone else moved, this might be concerning. That one Fighter whose range I highlighted is on a biorhythm downer, so his hit odds are low enough that he might miss if he tried to hit me.

Everything Micaiah really cares about.

...OK, I guess she should stay on top of her Skill...

Nobody moved!

No double, sadly, but Micaiah can take this guy out in two hits.

Uncontested. This is honestly embarassing.

This is probably just a metaphor for real conquering armies forcing the locals to change faiths. The goddess Ashera is worshipped in all countries, and it is not implied that any nation has alternative doctrines.

He gives us a Hand Axe. Nolan is one of the better units in the Dawn Brigade and he just got a 1-2 range toy.

Micaiah continues to stand with 6 HP and no takes to knock them away from her.

If you insist.

This guy takes his turn attacking. He came from the left, not the top.

The guy at the top was mentioned to have a biorhythm downer, but he's gotten over that and it's not really a good idea for Micaiah to do anything but this.

Although this will help.

Now Micaiah approaches this Fighter. Does nobody move on their own?

80 Hit. With his downer earlier, he was sitting on ~53. And it also looks like we're on a downer, too- as if it'll ever drop low enough that I might be even remotely scared of a miss.

That soldier is not interested in moving, so we can finish off.

For a Light rank.

This is Isaiya's stat page. I forgot until near the end of the fight, which is why he's so low on HP. I have seen this guy move if he thinks he can get a killshot on Micaiah, so if you've gotten this far and Micaiah doesn't have 11 Speed, you should just reset ~~and probably do a normal run.~~

This is Isaiya's combat window. I'll be spamming Herbs, but Micaiah can go surprisingly toe to toe with him for a myrmidon versus mage.

This boss conversation seems eerily appropriate for if he's going for a killshot.

Micaiah gets a more usual level. The HP is pleasant, though.

One thing about forgetting to show the boss's stats until now is that I can also show off this funny little feature in Radiant Dawn, and possibly other games too: enemy units benefit from weapon experience. There's no point in beorc getting additional ranks (they don't have access to better weapons, even if they can theoretically use them).

Micaiah, instead of healing, steps back and zaps Isaiya. 88% hit now, I'm almost worried.

I did not miss.

If "level 7 myrmidon in the alleyway of a slum" was a prime, sorry, you should've prepared for this. ~~Looks pointedly away from Edward.~~

Yay?

Sothe is ready to get us out of danger now!

Some nice running shots around places that are never used as combat maps.

This sounds like tempting fate. It's... mostly not.

Oh boy, Nico. Not a good thing to have right now.

They usually are.

Now that is a creative expletive.

The villagers tell us to get out of dodge.

And off we go.

That caught Begnion's attention.

And the villagers get in line to stop them.

"They're just Daein peasants!"

The citizens stand by us.

Micaiah gets a vision.

And stops escaping. Trust Micaiah's visions.

Yeah, Begnion is perfectly happy to pick up the "Evil Conqueror Bingo" card where Daein left off in PoR.

And one of the archers gets Nico.

Well, to be fair, I do not think the Begnions cared who they were shooting at.

...Is that fair to them? I doubt it.

I'm honestly kind of curious where Nico got hit.

"Affairs of state". You were just chasing bandit kids.

That's not strictly speaking included in what he meant by "affairs of state".

This Begnion tries to pin it on the Dawn Brigade. It would be nice for them if the Daein people could think badly of them.

Micaiah decides to throw a wrench into that plan.

Apparently no one told them about her secret skill...

Healing Hands. This CG shows a fairly decent shot of Nico's backside, and there's no indication of where the arrow even landed, not even a shirt rip where the arrow came out of. This is the main reason I wonder a) where Nico got hit and b) how lethal it would've been untended.

The Daein people are more elated than ever.

"Also she has silver hair!"

Sothe picks up Micaiah and runs away with her.

And the Begnions remember they're in a chase sequence.

The Daeins do this again. Even Nico.

"And it doesn't look like your Silver-Haired Maiden can pull a miracle a second time!"

Jarod is annoyed the chase isn't going faster.

When you put it like that, it sounds pathetic.

Jarod is here to lend a hand!

And he stabs three people. The rest of them (except Nico, his mother, and the old man) get the hint and go hide.

I'm honestly impressed the minions didn't open with this plan. Shows a care for Daein beyond Jarod's- existent.

Presumably because of your habit of stabbing people under your command.

Micaiah wakes up once the Dawn Brigade is well away from Nevassa, presumably.

He's talking about the fact that Sacrifice drains her powers. In JP, this skill is called 癒しの手, or "Healing Hands". The main thing about this change is that it is not necessarily obvious that a skill called "Healing Hands" hurts Micaiah in return, while "Sacrifice" makes it pretty obvious.