RPGM Star Knightess Aura [v0.44.0] [aura-dev]

[RagueltheUFO]

I believe in this run (my second) I didn't go to the Inn with Charlotte after the Spider Queen quest. She was jailed and I started the flying pig quest without her. I guess that was the way to level her up (since I remember that she was there during my first run in which I went with her to the Inn).

I don't know if it's intended that a jailed Charlotte loses both the participation in the quest and the ability to level up, but it probably is (I freed her while the pig quest was still active, I mean).

Speaking of my first run, my main qualm with the game was that I had a very hard time understanding where I had to go and where I was supposed to find enemies of my level. I roamed around not being sure about what I had to do and was forced to use the collar several times just to have a minimal sense of progress. I don't know if it's intended, if it was me who failed to understand the clues the game gave me or if it's actually an issue. In this second run I had a pretty good idea about what to do and thoroughly enjoyed the game.

This is actually a recent change. In an older build, Charlotte didn't join you when taking on the Avion. So I already knew how to fight it without her. Her joining is a double edge sword because you got to play escort mission, but she does a lot of damage and hopefully you have Protect at that point.

You either pay the fine for Charlotte when she's jailed, wait 10 days or do lewd scene. To avoid it, just spend the day at the bar with her.

Most of the fights are puzzles but every time there's an update, I attempt to not use the collar. And I'm mad that after 10000 attempts on the wolf boss that I finally figured out how to deal with this stupid thing. A generic idea...

1. Goblins are weak to light. You do the envy medicine quest to buy that and then route the goblins with this.
2. Goblin shaman is also weak to light but you need Water wall to not take that much damage from fire.
3. Orcs are weak to lightning. You have to run behind them to get the jump on them and deal with them.
4. Yellow spiders die in one hit to anything and fire spells.
5. Mother spider is weak to light and pierce moves.
6. Wolves are weak to light.
7. The boss wolf has the same weakness. If you kill all the wolves in the area once you take it on, it loses a turn when it tries to call in reinforcements. I finally figured out that rampage is literally all you got to do once you hit its weakness and used brittle to weaken its defense -_-
8. Blue slimes are weak to magic. It turns red and is then weak to physical attacks. Water all is good for it.
9. All human enemies are weak to lightning.
10. Minotaur is also weak to lightning. Spamming it guarantees that it can't use a unique attack.
11. Scorpions are weak to pierce. Poison scorpion is too.
12. Crows die to Slash (hits all enemies).
13. The dumb jellyfish is weak to fire but LOL I have just collared it.
14. The fungi is weak to fire. In the area you fight it in for the quest, use repeated use of wind to blow away the pollen. This is where you throw bombs at it too.

 

[Watters]

As it is the end of content I just gutted AGI down to 1 and shaved off a couple from all other stats to fund Purification + Collar.

If it isn’t fixed by the time we get to chapter two I will Save Edit my way through it. At present it is unplayable.

That is incredibly disheartening to hear. The closest I've gotten is all the way to the 3rd Battle with only Arwin and his stupid Slime (if that thing wasn't there, I swear, this wouldn't be nearly as frustrating) with Best Boy John frantically trying to keep his head above water. Only for the Slime to then switch to Fire Mode and one-shot him.

I don't even know if the 3rd Battle is the end.

 

[RagueltheUFO]

I'm doing the game again so I haven't gotten there yet LOL

 

[RagueltheUFO]

Okay, I can see the problem now with the boss of this area. I did an experiment and basically, if you're like me who invested in so many items, its not hard to dump stats. But I thought it was only supposed to be 3 battles. Apparently its 5 battles and that is way too much no matter how good you are. If you dump your stats before the battle, you can at least spend the first 2 times winning with relative ease.

After that, it takes 6 turns to constantly dump stats in battle and RNG is not on your side. If the teammates get the boost they need early on and then continue to take the money down to 0, then it will be easier to manage. As it is, even if you don't dump stats, they're going to die in one hit because there's no healing. You only have 2 healing items. Apple restores 15 and Vitality potions which there are not a lot of that heals 100 but it don't matter if the boss one-shots them anyway. Flash bombs are useless because Mammon uses magic.

From a story perspective, this makes sense that the party overall can't pull their own weight. The problem too though is that, 5 phases in a non story mode is overkill. :/

So yeah, I'm stuck and I'm not dumping the difficulty setting since I'm a trihard.

 

[Koneko Toujou]

does anyone know how to avoid the black screen after the star shine memory scene?

 

[Idontplay]

Mammon and Arwin is a nightmare of a boss challenge. No less because you have to fight 3 successive battles with them and no healing in between. I still haven't beaten it, even with changing the difficulty down to 'Story'. How has everyone else fared and what was your strategy?

My strategy:
1) Do not free the trapped souls in the "Party Realm"
2) Let Aura drinks all Blessed Water she has before the battle against Arwin
3) DO NOT KILL ARWIN at the start of the battle
4) Let the party die
5) Broke the collar
6) Use Defensive Stance and kill Mammon with the normal attacks
7) Then kill all the slimes Arwin can summon in the same way
8) Do not attack when Arwin is summoning a slime
9) Kill Arwin using the Light Spell
10) Restore the Starknightess powers with Purification

P.S. My difficulty is set to "normal" and I defeated Arwin in two or three rounds.

 

[Guitar_Villain]

Mammon and Arwin is a nightmare of a boss challenge. No less because you have to fight 3 successive battles with them and no healing in between. I still haven't beaten it, even with changing the difficulty down to 'Story'. How has everyone else fared and what was your strategy?

In my save from 10.0.0 I tried several times but couldn't win. I decided to reload my save from before the festival and try to power up a bit more (not to mention to get Duel Experience x1 on John, since I had already done the tag team fight before 10.0.1).

I got Aura to 160 hp by using Sweet Memories Drug and sleeping, then I got Tenacity I from the Head of the Guard, which is a skill that once per day prevents Aura from dying and leaves her at 1 hp (it was really useful). My Aura is particularly strong and I've defeated most of the bosses in the game without collar. I guess you should bring Aura to a similar level (that is, unlock most of the spells and Martials currently in the game, bring Hp to 150+, ATK and MATK to 25+, DEF and MDEF as high as you can, AGI to 15+) if you want to win against Arwin.

Once I found the correct strat, I managed to win against Arwin 5 times in a row without using the collar even once. In alternative you can reload the festival, maximize the Perika gains, save no one to keep the coins and Invest in collar restoration 4 times.

Ah, if your willpower is too low for any reason, try and buy Emerald Tea from the eastward merchant in the Festival to gain it back and remove the Cursed status.

My strat:

- Have Aura with Tailwind (you get it from the white clothed mage in the Inn, the girlfriend of the guy who wants the ring from the Goblin Shaman) and Offensive Stance prepared;

- Have Charlotte do Heat Up twice in the first two rounds of every match. It stacks and amps the damage from everyone in a significant way;

- Have John do Invest: Counter III in the first round of every match, then spam Protect.

- With Paul I merely resorted to Pierce-spam and heal back up.


- After this I focused Mammon -> Slime -> Arwin. I had Aura cast Thunderbolt on Arwin or Fire on the Slime to gain Tactical Advantage, then double attack on Mammon for 400 to 600 damage on Mammon (depending on the number of Heat Up received). Doing this twice kills Mammon, with Paul helping with the damage.

- If possible the Slime should be swapped to Red before he does his Rampage move, since with Offensive Stance up Aura can get one-shot by it. Tenacity I helps in that regard, along with healing up with Invest: Health every now and then.
The red slime must be killed asap as well since with Fire it one-shots the male party members.

- Arwin is weak unless he gets his bombs. I almost always had no problem killing him in a couple of rounds when he was the last one standing.



I was tempted to use the collar when Aura was left at 1 hp post Rampage (through Tenacity) or in a few other instances, but I tested my luck and got the better of it (having AGI up from Tailwind also helps avoiding surprises). If you want to Liquidate some stat I guess AGI is the best one since you can get it back up with a +3 through Slimy Cores, which don't look especially rare.

Even though 5 repetitions of the same encounter can get a little repetitive, I have to say this fight was a tough nut to crack and a nice showcase of how cool the combat system is in this game :Q__

 

[RagueltheUFO]

There's only one problem with these ideas. This is if we ignore trying to be a good person. Because then getting all 5 collars is a breeze.

Because you need 20k to get the pass. 10k to buy the debt of everyone and then 25k to get 5 collars.
You can convert money but now that affects the Greed curse which can be nullified by the tea. Assuming you are able to save your money (LOL I still end up stocking up on items and then realizing how pointless it is when you can't even heal without getting one-shoted).

 

[Idontplay]

Actually I used the collar two or three times against Arwin, my Aura had 0 corruption when she entered in the Arwin's realm, my Aura has never used the Sweet Memory Drug (I always sold them) and I have avoided all actions able to increase Aura's corruption during the Festival of Greed. In this way and drinking the Blessed Water, I was able to keep Aura's corruption under control; in fact at the end of this update my Aura has 11 of lewdness, 3 of corruption and 89 of willpower.

P.S. I still have to unlock almost all the mental changes introduced with the 0.9.2, because my Aura never had enough corruption points.

 

[Akaba333]

The first/Second arwin battle seem impossible unless you have a very OP Aura, the rest of the team is very weak.
The pokemon battle isn't too hard tough.

 

[puseofee]

Thanks for the reports! Hopefully fixed the bugs. Though the animation one I couldn't reproduce.
Yeah the +1 Corruption on the slaver might be a bit much, I removed it.

I think Heat Up is already pretty strong, also giving it Auto-Spell is a bit much. Though, Heat Up II is a good candidate for adding the Auto-Spell property as a power up feature.



Gonna leave this for a while to see if it's really a problem.



Huh, could you describe this a bit more? That sounds strange. Pretty sure I scripted the slime summoning as an action by the Slime Summoner so he shouldn't be able to do that.



Sorry I didn't find the spot. Could you maybe make a screenshot?



Have you checked that you have enough Corruption?



Thanks for the reports! Fixed.

Yes, I have OVER 25 Corruption at this point(playing or Story mode). Still can't install it. Celebrities I is the only thing preventing me.

 

[Pretentious Goblin]

Sorry if this has been answered already somewhere in the previous 75 pages, but is there a list of sex content planned and/or already implemented?

Here for what's in the game currently.

 

[FishFish322]

Does anyone know what Arwin's favourite number is because I have no clue.

 

[Watters]

My strategy:
1) Do not free the trapped souls in the "Party Realm"
2) Let Aura drinks all Blessed Water she has before the battle against Arwin
3) DO NOT KILL ARWIN at the start of the battle
4) Let the party die
5) Broke the collar
6) Use Defensive Stance and kill Mammon with the normal attacks
7) Then kill all the slimes Arwin can summon in the same way
8) Do not attack when Arwin is summoning a slime
9) Kill Arwin using the Light Spell
10) Restore the Starknightess powers with Purification

P.S. My difficulty is set to "normal" and I defeated Arwin in two or three rounds.

There's only one problem with these ideas. This is if we ignore trying to be a good person. Because then getting all 5 collars is a breeze.

Because you need 20k to get the pass. 10k to buy the debt of everyone and then 25k to get 5 collars.
You can convert money but now that affects the Greed curse which can be nullified by the tea. Assuming you are able to save your money (LOL I still end up stocking up on items and then realizing how pointless it is when you can't even heal without getting one-shoted).

I do really like the above strategy and how clever it is. Only using Star Knightess a single time, but by forcing Arwin to keep on re-summoning Slimes, eventually his Perika will be drained.

That being said, in my save, I had...I think 1000 or so Perika left? After using it to pay off everyone else's debts, that is. So if I opt for this strategy, I'll have to sacrifice my stats to regain my Collar (as I had already used it on the Slime Priest right before you enter the Money Realm). Luckily, I still have a backup save from before I started the Festival, so I'll try this way and see if I can manage it.

Thanks for the replies everyone!

 

[Black Sparrow]

Can anyone tell me where the star metal is located in the refugee camp area? Been looking for a while already. Thanks in advance.

 

[maxfold]

Well, what can I say.
Awesome idea and very interesting implementation. Although I do not like RPG maker games, this is a great exception (in particular, there is a mode for the story, which helps not to strain too much on moments that are not particularly interesting)! I will not even be afraid of this and will subscribe to Patreon. I really hope that the story will come to an end. 5 hours and the story with events does not let go.
In some moments (as for me) there are not enough tips when completing quests, but so far this is practically not annoying.

read several pages and did not find answers, if it is not difficult to answer a few questions:

1. will the save work after the update?
2. I can’t raise my magic reserve (to 10) in order to learn the necessary spells and read new books in the magic shop. What do you recommend?
3. a question to the creator - I read on some page that several options for ending the story are planned (as well as the variant with minimal corruption). Is there a chance that one of the scenarios will lead to the fact that Alicia decides that she wants another Aura's and not the one that was originally planned this blond guy)). For example, to capture on yourself or make her the new prince of darkness dependent on her (a lot of options).

PS: if there is a game with a similar focus (corruption, brainwashing, mental changes, possession, mind control) please advise, otherwise this game flies very very quickly.

 

[Pretentious Goblin]

1. I can’t raise my magic reserve (to 10) in order to learn the necessary spells and read new books in the magic shop. What do you recommend?

PS: if there is a game with a similar focus (corruption, brainwashing, mental changes, possession, mind control) please advise, otherwise this game flies very very quickly.

Get some Ether -> take it to the alchemist -> have him make mana stones out of it -> buy the mana stones -> use them from the inventory.

PS: if there is a game with a similar focus (corruption, brainwashing, mental changes, possession, mind control) please advise, otherwise this game flies very very quickly.

The only games I've seen that have a similar "mind room" concept are Nano-Control and Accidental Mind.

 

[maxfold]

Get some Ether -> take it to the alchemist -> have him make mana stones out of it -> buy the mana stones -> use them from the inventory.

thanks. i'll try this tomorrow

The only games I've seen that have a similar "mind room" concept are Nano-Control and Accidental Mind.

came across. I didn’t like Nano-Control, it’s somehow insipid - no soul! I have not tried it in Accidental Mind, maybe because it is purely HTML.

 

[aura-dev]

That moment you realise your Isekai is a Shounen.

Well that was a bit of a roller-coaster. Overall the ending of the Festival was good. Most of it was amazing, but one big frustrating chunk really brings down the average.

Bugs:
- During the phase one battles I got a “TypeError Cannot read property ‘subject’ of null” when starting a battle one time.
- One of the (many) times the slime got summoned it didn’t become viable until it took an action, although it could still be targeted.
- When the festival ended (after Richard left) got ‘ERROR: Tried to close objective ID 6 of quest with ID 20, but no such objective is registered.’
- Not sure if it is a bug but on several occasions I lost a battle in the first phase but things continued as if I had won. No obvious pattern.
- During the second phase the mutated hydrangea’s pink mist skill reduces Aura’s willpower, despite her not being involved in the fight.
- Perika did not decrease when Aura uses purification during the cutscene.

Non bug but annoying: what does the ‘numb’ status effect actually do?

Start with the bad news, the first phase battles are a nightmare and I fucking hate them.
- I acknowledge that it might have been my build to a degree. MATK and DEF is sub optimal for fighting Mammon. (Although I suspect an ATK focused build would be just as sub optimal for dealing with Arwin.) More critically I did the maid scenes so was at Curse I even starting from max willpower. That said…
- The RNG sucks. The slime always gets at least one spell off (unless you removed the collar) which will one-shot Paul or Charlotte at any health and John at anything but max. There is nothing you can do to prevent this. Mammon will sometimes open the battle by throwing his damage spell at Charlotte, which will one-shot her as often as not. There is nothing you can do to prevent this.
- Semi-related to RNG is Mammon going super saiyan. If he happens to have his buffs up when damaged enough to Enhance the damage spike can easily kill Aura without any time to heal. Similar if Aura is debuffed and he does one of his big attacks. On one occasion he went Enhance while he was buffed and Aura debuffed and did 161 damage with a basic attack.
- (A side note here but this very much highlights the problem of not being able to see enemy health. If you could gauge how close Mammon was to his limit break you could play around his buffs. Without that information it becomes just random chance.)
- Mammon is high health, high MDEF, low DEF and does not appear to be vulnerable to anything but Light. The merchant eventually gets flight, bombs every other turn and periodic full heals.

I assume there must be a Smart way to beat the first phase of this boss gauntlet. Some trick or strategy to winning without sacrificing critical amounts of stats. But for the life of me I cannot find it.

With that out of the way… everything else was amazing.

The second phase is pure gold. Both thematically and mechanically.
It has been a minor theme that for all her personal genius and drive, alone Aura will fall. Only with friends beside her is she is invincible as she believes. This has been shown before, but never explicitly stated. The soldiers during the intro. Rose’s friendship being what prevents deeper mental changes. Paul snapping Aura out of the maid brainwashing. Here we see that brought forwards and highlighted.
Mechanically it is even better. During the first phase your allies are not entirely worthless but clearly not pulling their weight. Backed by Star Shine they are very much competitive again. More subtle but no less enjoyable is the fact that Aura’s fellow adventurers aren’t more powerful than Arwin’s monsters. In a direct, straightforward fight they would probably lose. However three non-sapient monsters and a merchant don’t have much skill and even basic tactical thinking makes the fight easy. Fight smart and victory is yours.

Thinking towards the future Star Shine is a great way of keeping other characters relevant while still allowing Aura to grow into the mantle of a Legendary Hero. It would rather undermine things if junior adventurers could level grind their way up to being demon king slaying powerhouses at the same speed as the Legendary Hero.
Also I look forwards to chapter two giving the opportunity to see powerful enemies get beaten to death by a lowly slime while Aura sits back and relaxes.

The final phase I can only describe as catharsis. The demon general is clearly powerful and clearly a threat. However with the Star Knightess running at full power you have everything you need to take him apart. After all that both Aura and the payer have been through it is exceedingly satisfying to indulge in some Righteous Face Punching.

The twist with Richard works well enough. I’m not particularly fond of the whole ‘no the villain wins anyway’ bait and switch tropes. But I will admit that it gives a good justification for why everyone on Roya isn’t suddenly going to be helping out now that Aura is known as the summoned hero. Also it is refreshing to have both the hero and villain insisting that this is clearly their victory. Having the protagonist be boastful, arrogant and hyper competitive helps to remind the player that the antagonist is also talking out his arse when claiming that everything is going his way.

I suspect that the Bad End for Aura isn’t going to be a Good End for Alicia. Richard is clearly toying with her. The only question is whether she will realise and try to betray him or just be thrown aside.

Somehow the fact that the Thugs were explicitly nameless bit parts makes their heroic sacrifice all the more meaningful. The soldiers at the start weren’t around long enough to get names. But these two are people Aura could have known but didn’t see as worth her time. Yet they still gave their lives for her victory. The fact that a lewd RPGM game can inspire such emotion is a testament to the writing skill that has gone into it.

Thanks for the great feedback!

1. I hope fixed all the bugs just now. The first two with the slime and the crash are super weird RPGM behavior and suspect a bug on their side. I have a hacky solution, and it passed quite some testing now but I'm not 100% if those are fixed. Will need to see.
2. NUMB makes it that the affected character cannot use Martials, however it only lasts 1 turn. So you need to hit them with NUMB before they can make a move. Tailwind + Thunderbolt is a great counter to Mammon's Advantage + Slash II.
3. I did quite some rebalancing. Expect 0.10.2 to have invest buff and heal spells work on all allies (but they are also twice as expensive) and Arwin's spells to also cost more, leading to a only 3-round battle. I did some testing with a relatively weak Aura under Curse II who mostly contributes by casting money spells. It requires being attentive and to strategize, but you can win using 3-4k Perika.

For those who masochists who like to try a way to figure out beating the very hard fight in 0.10.1 but would like some tips:

Spoiler

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[RagueltheUFO]

Low key I'm glad that this conversation is being had like an actual video game forum and ignoring the fact there's hentai for the sake of actually trying to get past part 1 LOL