Let's play Ogre Battle: This is the dawning of the age of Zeteginea

26. March On



Thanks for joining us in Let's Play Ogre Battle. We've arrived a little late, and Norn is already halfway to the enemy base.

Say, is that reputation in our reputation meter? Weird.

Today, we've wised up and taken a detour. We manage to sneak through without a single enemy encounter!



Joke's on you, buddy. This is the finish line.



Previa deals 60 damage or so to the Cockatris. This is our reprisal.



Uh... I guess there's not too much to say today.



Hey, Tristan's finally on board with our operation! Unlike with MOGRI, he doesn't give us the ARMBAND. I guess we're not getting the World ending...

Spoiler: General Previa uses zero black magic so this guy doesn't know what he's talking about!

If I'm not mistaken, he can use Meteor, which is black-elemental, so that's probably what that line was referring to.

I've never seen him use it; he appears to fall in line with the other Generals and simply use an Iainuki attack from the rear.

BUT speaking of General Previa, there is a lot of confusion on the Internet as to how you get the Armband, so let me clear it up:

Just have Tristan in your party and a high reputation. That's it! As my LP showed, you don't even need an empty item space!

But back to the countdown...







A quick look at the opening map shows a fairly barren place, with only three visible towns. That's right, this is another hidden town hunt map!



Hidden towns aside, this is one of the more straight-forward maps in some time. You should push for the visible towns of San Martin and Angua, and then simply protect them. 90% of the enemy units--most of which either fly or can move quickly in water--will beeline to one of those, with a few pushing to your base.

If you've got a couple of flying units, you can use them to find all the hidden towns (I still use high ALI units but your reputation isn't affected by liberating hidden towns) while you concentrate on guarding those two cities. My MOGRI was a little high so I stationed another guard there. Otherwise, it's pretty simple!



If you haven't been using Krakens, you can find them here. They're actually pretty decent units, as long as they are in water. But they're so miserable on land (where 90% of the game takes place) that they're not worth it.

You can also find Platinum Dragons (upgraded Gold Dragons) in the mountains here if you're desperate for them.





"Oh! Good for you! I am actually a monk in disguise, sent to test you. The best way to earn the trust of the people is to avoid evil!"

Ah, the old "honey pot" trap!

Saying yes will get you an item that sells for a bit of Goth and a sizable reputation hit. If you're going for the best ending, you really don't want to be losing it save from the occasional Tarot Card, so just say no!



"Many cities around Kluyn have prospered that way."



"If you want to know more about the Grail, go to the city of Martinique. Martinique is on an island to the North. Sorry, I forgot which island, though!"



"General Luvalon has been stationed there. This is not a strategically important area. I wonder why the Empire is here?"



"There was something special about that knight that I just can't put my finger on... His name? Parcival, I think it was..."

I have a theory that at one time, the intention was to send the player on a chase to find Parcival, the knight who holds the grail. You see him and the Grail mentioned all over this map. Perhaps as a blessing following the whole Zodiac Stone fiasco, finding Parcy is pretty straight forward.



Rauny has a dialogue on the next map, so I bring Tristan's army in to get her a few more levels. Lightning is pretty useful on a map with a lot of water-type enemies, and it does pretty good against some of the other enemies here too like these Wyverns.



I swear I'm going to use one of these soonish!



I get pretty... lucky... and get a few drops like this in this scene. While inefficient, I'm going to create a unit to tackle the final boss and pumping their stats up is very advised.



"It's also said that he bathed in dragon's blood and is now invincible!

Would you like me to use my magic to find Luvalon's weakness?"



For 150,000 Goth you can go jump in the sea! I'll give it away for free: his weakness is fire.

In fairness to Mr. Monk here, he does more than tell you the fire weakness; he will also give you a BOLEAS Bow, which is a Fire enhanced weapon that grants +17 STR. That is a pretty good weapon! But it's not a 150,000 goth weapon.



"...and yet Endora has sent one of the 4 Devas here! Do you know why? There can only be one reason. Endora is after the Grail. She probably wants to use it to try and restore what is left of her Empire."





"Hey! Don't get mad... Let me give you a juicy bit of information... Do you know who originally found the Grail? His name was Parcival. After he found the Grail, he was said to have disappeared with it, at the command of King Gran. If that's true, then Parcival is the only one who knows where the Grail is now."



I've got MUSASHI the Lich and his Wraith companions guarding San Martin, which as a reminder is the closest non-hidden town to the enemy base. While not numerous, there are some Monks and Paladins leading some of the enemy armies which either necessitates the back-row murdering the offending holy do-gooder before they act, or sucking it up and spending REVIVEs on your undead units. I end up with a bit of both.



Another victory gets Ashe and his Cheribums level 22. That of course means...



Seraphims!



MOW THEM DOWN MY PRETTIES!



"Even King Gran found the Grail somewhere on the continent, and used it to make Zenobia a stronger nation."



I like to think this town is called "MULLIGAN'S LAW" and stars a cranky old southern lawyer who solves crimes and then send the bad guys to JAIL by exposing their LIES.

"Gran took the Grail back to Zenobia, and used it to rule his people. No one alive has ever even seen the Grail, and no one is sure if it even exists."



We squeak in with what what essentially is us breaking even (which is not technically true as we had to pay to deploy all these units in the first place).



"He bathed in Bytalth's blood, and that has made him invincible!"

Pretty metal!

Except... PLOT HOLE!

Our Dragoon Friend, Fenril, fought Bytalth for seven days or whatever before slaying the dragon. The result CURSED Fenril to make him look lizard-like.

CLEARLY what happened was that Lulavon bathed in a dead dragon's blood! It's the only thing that makes sense! That's not just the truth, it is...






"It looks like an ordinary cup, but for some reason just looking at it calms the heart. Every time someone creates a new government, they want to use the Grail. Unfortunately this has caused many wars throughout history."

Ha, who would be stupid enough to start a war over a lousy...

(Looks around.)

Oh. Well, let's end this war! In one or two more maps!





(I like how despite that High Monk guy being a complete coward at least he acknowledges how dangerous he was.)

"But we'll see how you can do against me. You won't be able to take me as easily as you did him! Today, we battle for the Grail!"



(Spoiler: I in fact can take him even easier!)



The General here is protected by a group of Samurai. Luvalon is pretty beefy, but with undead up front and the Samurai Iainuki's aimed at a Lich, he is not winning any damage race.



Fire you said?



"Please... Take this... sword. It is fit only for... victors... Goodbye, gentleman..."



Wait a minute? Black-aligned? A respectable but not amazing +11 STR? This is as a very underwhelming gift!?



All I'm saying is at least give me a mystic treasure or something!



Drat.



Oh well. We return to the Enemy Base once the map is cleared to start the hunt for the GRAIL!



"In place of King Gran, I have guarded the Grail until this day. The stories I have heard are true. You, MOGRI, are without doubt a True Hero. Please accept the Grail. You are destined to be its next keeper."







Well uh, that was underwhelming. But at least I made sure I had space for it this time!



We are three mystic treasures for three mystic treasures down! We've recruited EVERYONE worth recruiting, and caught em' all with the Zodiac Stone hunt. This means that all we need to do is keep our Reputation near the top of the ol' meter and we'll get our World ending!

We've got only three more maps to go. And next one is pretty unique! Join us next time for The End Nears, or "WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU'RE PRO-EMPIRE!?"

A couple of things:

Luvalon's name was originally LeBaron, which matches with the theme of the other three Devas - cars.

Also, his fire weakness seemed kind of arbitrary to me, until I realized something. His near-invincibility comes from bathing in the blood of a Divine Dragon. The only fightable Divine Dragon in the series is Grozz Nuy in OB64, whose class is Death Bahamut. The Platinum Dragons in this game were also Death Bahamuts in Japan. Their greatest weakness is fire. So now I kind of get it.

27. Blitzkrieg



You know the drill.



Again, we're taking the very slightly longer way there. The bulk of the enemy forces are headed due south, so we hang a left.



We do run into a few enemies, but they tend to die before they can act. Props to the rear Kraken for surviving long enough to swing at DEDMET.



Buddy, you don't know the half of it.



Props to Luvalon: he's too fast for Norn or the Cockatris to hit, and he deals 70+ damage to the Cockatris with his attacks. If we were fighting fair, this would be a tough battle.



But we're not, and single-target melee attackers don't impress us, no matter how strong they are.



It's not every day!



Oh, oops.

Luvalon gives us a sword "fit for victors": as Eddie already mentioned, the Bizen is an unremarkable STR+11 weapon.

I finally caught up on this and I'm sorry I waited so long. It's a delight of an LP!