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I’m sure you’d like to read something profound and thought provoking from Shamus regarding Daud and such, but he’s busy being lame or something. Instead, it’s Real Question Time:
Is there any tense, serious moment I can’t ruin with abject silliness and stupidity?
Dead or Alive 5 Last Round

I'm not surprised a fighting game has an absurd story. I just can't figure out why they bothered with the story at all.
The Terrible New Thing

Fidget spinners are ruining education! We need to... oh, never mind the fad is over. This is not the first time we've had a dumb moral panic.
D&D Campaign

WAY back in 2005, I wrote about a D&D campaign I was running. The campaign is still there, in the bottom-most strata of the archives.
Grand Theft Auto Retrospective

This series began as a cheap little 2D overhead game and grew into the most profitable entertainment product ever made. I have a love / hate relationship with the series.
The Biggest Game Ever

How did this niche racing game make a gameworld so massive, and why is that a big deal?
No. No there isn’t.
Edit: With regards to the extra-long level – it felt kind of fitting to me, since you’ve effectively broken out of the mission-based structure that dominated the first half of the game.
after watching the Walking Dead LP no, no there isn’t josh not at all.
I agree with that cast that once I had finished getting my gear, fighting Daud, and getting passed his forces, I was ready to move on from this mission. Then the game cut to this next section and I was a bit peeved.
Like I said, this could have easily been broken up into two sections.
I may be a little sore because this is the very same section of the game where I got my one kill on the playthrough where I was going for Clean Hands. (I did actually succeed eventually, but this level is so long that I almost didn’t want to bother.)
Was the sign at the beginning supposed to say something? I just saw “warning Outflow Area”
I figure Shame was going to put “spoiler” somewhere, but I think he forgot. I even screencapped it and messed with the curves in Photoshop, but I don’t think anything was added.
Maybe we need Corvo’s mask to see it.
Frankly, I love describing Spoiler Warning with “Warning: Outflow Area.”
Truth in advertising! Especially with Rutskarn involved.
I’m a bit disappointed that Josh interrupted the training sequence. The dialogue is directly taken from Thief 1. I thought for sure Shamus would have something to say about that.
And Im also surprised that Shamoose has missed it.Its a really nice scene to observe,and they just bugger off afterwards.
Yeah, I thought it was a pretty cool nod to the inspiration.
Man. The sequel to Deus Ex: Human Revolution needs to take a long, hard look at the Daud bossfight. *This* is how you do bossfights in a game where a variety of approaches to combat are encouraged.
Aye, agreed. And this is the perfect bossfight because it is entirely avoidable. Far as I know, there’s 4 ways of dealing with Daud here –
1) Ignore him, just take the key.
2) Sneak up to him, (optionally choke him out), loot his pocket, then get the key and spare him.
3) Sneak up to him, backstab.
4) Unveil yourself, have cool fight. At then end, choose to spare or kill him.
Best part? No choice is forced on you, and at no point does Corvo go into cutscene mode and stroll into Daud’s room in full view, saying “YOU KILLED MY JESSAMINE AND NOW I WILL MAKE YOU PAY FOR IT, PREPARE THYSELF VILLAIN!”. Nope. What would be a custcened-to-hell walk-in into this room, here it’s just a regular place that you can approach when and how you like.
Also, now that you’ve mentioned bossfights and DX:HR sequel, I wonder what(if any) boss battles / encounters will be in the upcoming Thief?
Maybe you’ll have to steal something like a shiney gold table, so when you get it, you have to literally carry it slowly around, moving very slowly and not being able to hide because of reflected light, except you can use the table as sort of a shield, and move when the guards aren’t looking, and hiding when they are looking. So your theft target item is also your cardboard box to hide in, so to speak.
Oh, and of course thre has to be some sort of instakill or insta-failure if you get spotted. That’s how stealth games work, you see.
I’m kind of hoping that stealth games have grown out of their ‘insta-death if you get spotted’ phase, but I might just be being naive.
I wouldn’t see the necessity in the mechanic anyways when, if you really want to do it without being seen, you’d end up reloading on failure anyways.
It is interesting to contrast scenes like this with scenes like the fight against the Naked Muscle Man and the scene with Zhou in DX: Human Revolution.
In my first playthrough, I blinked behind him and choked him out. Then the game told me to pick his pocket to “send a message”. I was going to anyway b/c bone charm, but that was a nice touch. I didn’t even know he was a tough opponent until my second, High Chaos playthrough.
It would have been a nice touch for him to show his face during the assassination and instead of immobilizing you, let you try to fight him a bit. You’d remember him as a tough opponent then.
That would kinda clash with Daud’s character, though. Daud is the kind of person who wants keep his kills as out of sight as possible during his hits. He won’t show his face unless it is absolutely necessary.
Agreed, and I like what goes unspoken in that scene. Daud sends a few of his men- whom you defeat, and then comes himself to finish the job. Still would have been nice to fight him a bit.
They’re supposedly “fixing” the boss fights for the WiiU Ultimate Edition of DX:HR, which has me a bit curious how they’ll pull that off. Not curious enough to buy a WiiU, mind you, but still…
It’s mostly changing the level surrounding the boss fights to allow for multiple approaches, from what I hear.
They can’t give you non-lethal options, but they can make possible to use stealth and other things.
Disappointing, but not unexpected, I figure adding the non-lethal option would require extra voice-work and cutscenes, and the WiiU port seems to be mostly technical improvements. Bleh, that really makes me wish they’d gone the extra mile with that.
Sure, but frankly I wouldn’t complain if they took the laziest option and just played the “you won” cutscene right after the “you’re dumb” one.
Anyone able to think of a game where they just outright patched out some of the content after release on account of it sucking? I wonder how such a move would be received.
The Diablo 2 expansion removed a fight against a permanent monster, does that count?
That could work with Zhou. Adam walks in on her, she immediately hits her panic button (why would it be all the way across the room in the first place?) and cut to the fight with security.
In particular, I’d like to note how they manage to make him immune to your “I win” abilities without turning the fight into a ridiculous slog if you didn’t focus your abilities on combat.
The Missing Link DLC demonstrates that they’ve worked out how to do boss fights properly by themselves, fortunately.
okay jump it way cool ,i just took the door that was where you first went off after well playing around with the tallboys and dying a few times i skip them then.
I forgot the Sokolov picture and you went so quickly up to the lady that you missed it.
What does a game needs to DO to make you respect it enough to NOT do your silly antics? What examples can you provide of the last time a game EARNED your respect, and resisted the URGE to Goomba Stomp.
There is no hope, really. The player will do it by accident and totally ruin the mood.
The Cutscene Conundrum:
With cutscenes, the characters will do something stupid and break the tone.
Without cutscenes, the player will do it.
It probably doesn’t help much when there’s an audience too.
Insane nerd logic time! When a person with Outsider powers uses the freeze time, it doesn’t affect anyone else with Outsider powers, correct? But also at no point playing the game does Corvo notice the world around him stop without an Outsiderer visibly present. But it’s ludicrous to think Daud would not once have used freeze time in that interval.
=> Freeze time is localised to the area around the outsiderer.
But how can this be? The people around the edges would notice if their colleague a meter away suddenly stops moving.
=> The freeze-time force is strongest at it’s centre and then drops off gradually but exponentially with distance. It might look to person A that person B is moving a little slower than normal, but person A is also being slowed at a speed that stops him noticing anything completely out of the bounds of the ordinary. Corvo won’t notice because, as long as he’s sufficiently far away, he’d find himself moving just a tiny fraction faster than normal.
So are there any negative affects to this? Any clocks in the area would be found to be a few seconds slow, whats more the earth around Corvo would presumably be slowed, meaning as the rest of the earth rotates it piles up slightly, compressing the earth together and creating tiny little fissures and light would pile up a little creating a flash when the ability wears out. Air molecules would find themselves drifting a little towards the distortion centre
Other than that I can’t really think of any particularly noticable bad effects of time been frozen noticeably in a local area :( A bit of draft and a bit of a bright light. I was hoping something would explode
Alternate theory: Daud only uses Freeze Time when the Outsider is talking to Corvo.
Alternate alternate hypothesis: Freeze Time is really more like a “super-fast” time. It just looks like everyone else stops because you’re doing the Sammy Squirrel on Caffeine thing.
This option is much better.. Speeding one person (or a select group of people) up to be way faster than everything else is way less problematic than stopping everything other than a few people.
Except that can’t be how it works in game. How would other Outsiderers be affected by one person speeding themselves up? How come you can choke out guards in freeze time? How come your bullets will leave your gun? Why does running into stationary bullets hurt?
I think the way it works is anything you touch in freeze time gets put back into the time stream
EDIT: Also if we go to super nitpicky levels, you’ve got problems with stuff like friction and everything breaking at your touch if you’re going super fast. And running into a wall in freeze time should kill you
“Except that can't be how it works in game.”
Why not?Its just relative speeds that are important,not how you achieve them.Whether you get a huge bubble that stops everyone around you or a small bubble that speeds up just you and a few things around you is irrelevant,yet the other option makes more sense.
Another alternate theory is what guys brought up in this playthrough:you arent doing anything to time itself,you are hopping to an alternate dimension where time works differently.
“How would other Outsiderers be affected by one person speeding themselves up?”
Because outsider is the one giving you the ability.So he is probably just being a dick and doing it for all of those who have that power around you.
“How come you can choke out guards in freeze time? How come your bullets will leave your gun? Why does running into stationary bullets hurt?”
Because everything you touch gets pulled into your sped up time/alternate dimension with you.So the guard that you grab gets sped up/transported to that other dimension where you can choke him out,and then gets transported back when you let him go.Same for bullets.
It wouldn’t work because a human has to trigger powers.
Let’s say Corvo and Daud are both capable of activating powers that boost their speed to 1000x for a short period. Sure, in theory, if they were both active with that power at the same time, they’d move at the same speed, and see everyone else slower.
But the problem is how we transition from “normal mode” to “crazy sped up” mode.
For neither to be able to “get the drop” on the other one, they would both have to activate the powers at EXACTLY the same time.
First, this is counter to the gameplay – Daud doesn’t appear to have to do anything active (like activate a power) to “match” Corvo in “time bend land.” I don’t think I’ve ever seen Daud try to use the power on Corvo, but it would be weird if there was some requirement for you to “do something” at that exact moment.
Also, this is counter to “how human beings work.” The average human reaction time to take an action based on seeing something is half a second, but with training and anticipation can maybe get as low as a quarter second. Guess what? In the quarter second it took YOU to activate your power when you noticed me do it, I’ve had 250 seconds of “sped up” time, during which I’ve already killed you.
The effect changes the relative time ratio between a dimension that those with sufficient outsider powers occupy and the rest of the world.
I’m still confused as to why it brings you along even if you haven’t collected any runes…
And then you’re back at the original observation – if someone else with “freeze time” used that power, wouldn’t Corvo get “brought along” with it every time? And then Corvo would observe the effects of “freeze time” when he didn’t use the power, and thus wonder “hey, what happened there?”
MST3K mantra time.
We know we’re being silly right? I started this on the basis it’s insane overreading into things that didn’t matter =D I don’t think anyone has been taking it too seriously
It doesnt matter who initiates it,its ultimately the outsider that does the thing.He is the one with the power to say “nope” when you do your hand thing,and also with the power to say “this guy too” when you do it.And if you check dauds hand,it is glowing while you are in time stop land,so his power is active at the same time as yours.
And that also explains why it doesnt affect everyone with the power in the world:Because the outsider is the ultimate judge.You arent actually stopping time,you are asking him to do it for you,and for those around you.
I like that idea. The Outsider does seem to have his favorites and likes pitting them against each other.
“Alternate theory: Daud only uses Freeze Time when the Outsider is talking to Corvo.”
…or perhaps the other way around. We only have to talk to the Outsider BECAUSE Daud uses freeze time. Except then the mercy option for Daud becomes much less palatable.
I was thinking something along those lines; the Outsider sees Daud activating Freeze Time, decides he doesn’t want Corvo to know, and shows up for a chat.
(And he probably talks to Daud every time Corvo uses it. Daud’s probably really sick of talking to the Outsider by now.)
If that were the case Daud would beg for death, not life.
“So…what’s up, Daud? Still killing people? Good, good. Yeah, I was just here, but… uh… OK, well, never mind. See you later.”
I actually came to a similar conclusion. Since both Daud and the Torturer are immune to Bend Time, this would only make sense if Bend Time is localized.
However, I believe that Bend Time is almost like a “Summon Alternate Dimension”. Anyone with Outsider marks caught in the area when Bend Time activates are pulled into the dimension as well and enjoy the benefits of moving in slowed/stopped time. Everyone else never notices.
“I actually came to a similar conclusion. Since both Daud and the Torturer are immune to Bend Time, this would only make sense if Bend Time is localized.”
Or if every time you use it,outsider has to do something to the world personally,which lets him choose who will be left sped up and who wont.
You’re assuming two things that are not (to my knowledge) demonstrated. That Daud has freeze time as a power at all, and that having freeze time is the thing that makes Daud immune to being frozen.
Daud never (that I’ve seen) attempts to use freeze time on you in the battle. That would be counterproductive, since it would freeze his helpers. This also means it’s never demonstrated that CORVO is immune to freeze time (i.e. proving that having “freeze time” makes you immune).
Ability to freeze time and immunity from being frozen may be separable.
I could imagine any of the following being logically consistent:
* Daud does not have freeze time. He has a different outsider power for “immunity to time freezing” (shared with the Torturor) that Corvo may lack. The reason you’ve never felt time freeze is that Daud doesn’t have that ability.
* Daud has freeze time AND immunity from time freezing. Corvo has freeze time, but no immunity. Daud HAS used freeze time, Corvo just froze (like everyone else) and didn’t notice it. Unexplained in this case is why he didn’t freeze you in combat, though I could imagine wanting to fight “chivilrously” with his guilty conscience as a fig leaf here…
* Freeze time automatically grants immunity to being frozen to all who have the power. Daud, being a considerably better player than Josh, simply rarely if ever has need of it, and so he’s never used it while you’ve been awake and around other people.
Or, if you don’t like any of those, dude, it’s magic. Let it go. :)
Did you watch the episode? Daud TOTALLY stopped time during that battle. It’s an ability he has. When time is stopped, his Assassins don’t move, Corvo does.
It wasn’t an assumption. It was an established fact. As was Corvo’s immunity.
On the other hand, Corvo is immune even when he does not have Bend Time unlocked, so it can assumed that either having Outsider powers or having the ability to Bend Time is necessary to not be affected.
Hmm…OK, maybe misunderstood – I thought Josh initiated the “stop time.”
Also, there are assassins with “blink” but are still affected by stop time, so just “having powers” doesn’t seem to be enough.
See the reply I made to the post right below this one.
I meant to say “Outsider marks”, not “powers”. My bad.
But not sufficient, since Daud’s assassins can blink and do that tractor-beam thingy.
Remember that Daud’s assassins don’t actually have the Outsider’s mark. They get their powers via Daud, who has the ability to bestow a lesser version of his powers onto his followers.
Since they don’t have the mark, they don’t have immunity.
Now that makes me sad that I can’t train up my own posse with Outsider-lite powers and throw them at Daud’s posse.
…And all I can think of is this Dilbert strip…
This was always interesting in the D&D setting. What exactly happens when a high level mage casts timestop?
This mattered slightly when some of our group noticed that you could use permanency to make time stop last 24 hours, which meant you could theoretically rest and cast it again, maintaining it indefinately. It was decided that eventually a demogorgan would basically come and kill you out of annoyance that he couldn’t really do anything.
Except Time stop is not one of the specific list of spells you’re allowed to use with permanency. You can’t just make ANY spell permanent. That would allow all kinds of cheese.
Persistent, not permanent. It’s an insanely expensive metamagic that can set any spell with a duration to a duration of 24 hours. There’s ways to cheapen it so you can do it on even 9th-level spells.
Time Stop was errataed to have instantaneous duration, pretty much specifically to block out that sort of cheese.
You can still do it in 4th edition! My memory is fuzzy, but the general idea is there’s a “Can’t die until this round is over” ability and a “stop time but take damage ability.” Combine the two, and you have a never ending round which you will die at the end of.
It’s silly and useless, but funny.
And the dlc deals with that problem:It seems daud is able to bleed some of his powers to his allies around him.One of these powers is time stop.So it seems that anyone with a power is emanating a sort of an aura,and if two people with time stop get inside each others aura,it doesnt matter who stops time,both will be dragged into it.
Daud had the power to imbue others with his power even before DLC.
True,but the mechanic of those wasnt spelled out before it.
I’m deathly curious -those two whalers in the hall: Did you deliberately miss that first shot to make them turn around, or was that just fortuitous?
Huh. I never had a full-out battle vs. Daud like that, I always either choekd him out or backstabbed him. Didn’t know his battle was so special, with all the time stops and dialogue. Neat.
Also, that area with the tallboys, it’s actually a pretty large zone with lots to do. Frex, there’s a whole submission just in there where you need to help plague survivors get through a guard outpost and get them in safety from tallboys – if you don’t do anything, the tallboys inevitably bomb the building the survivors are hiding in. And the cool part is, you can actually rig up spotlight power yourself, intentionally divertng tallboys onto the building so that you have an easier time getting to the gate! (And if you didn’t know about that subquest, you’d never know you just got about 10 people killed)
Also, I didn’t know you could just jump over that wall of light. Cool. I assumed you absolutely had to either possess someone or remove the whale oil tank from the charger…
Yeah, I heard his fight really hyped up. I found him and neckstabbed him before he could move. Then I reloaded and tried the fight, killed him in two pistol headshots.
I think that those people all turn into Weepers if Chaos is high.
Not in the level, no. The mission to save them is available in both low and high chaos versions of this level.
Not that I recall. When I went through in High Chaos, those guys definitely became weepers and I didn’t have access to the quest.
If it’s not Chaos, then what is it exactly.
Just checked on the wiki, okay, you were right, it is only there in low chaos situations. My mistake.
I also love how the battle between you and Daud changes slightly in low vs. high chaos.
If you’re in Low Chaos, Daud sees how you’ve chosen your path and fights you head on, by himself. When his men intervene, he shouts at them to stay back and let him take you on.
In High Chaos, he sees that you’re no better than him. You’re not an honorable man and could even be worse. To stop you in your tracks, he won’t let stop his men from partaking in the fight.
His dialog even changes. He’ll have a different thing to tell the one giving him news of your escape depending on Chaos.
And the most impressive thing:Not once does he say that youre in over your head.
That sounds like a man who has been watching Disclosure Alert. =D
Can’t wait for you guys to handle Brayko. Considering what you made out of the Deng battle that’s going to be an episode to remember, or so I hope.
I’m hoping they go for the slightly anti-climatic OD
The music helps a lot.
Shame they didn’t get their original choice of music, which was The Final Countdown.
Yes, it was.
I think if that had been the boss music, I would never have played Alpha Protocol more than once…
At least not with the sound on.
Well, Brayko is full of that cheesy nonsense, so it fits perfectly.
This is why this has been such an enjoyable game to watch being played. I played through twice, deliberately trying to do things differently, and still see Josh doing stuff I never knew about. And I missed the rescue section as well.
Hm… I wonder if this is why I didn’t get the “don’t kill anyone” achievement. I had no idea there was a quest there.
Same, as with many other games at this point I was kinda rushing to the endgame so I didn’t even try exploring this post-Daud part much beyond finding my way to the level exit.
If you use the brand on the High Overseer, doesn’t he show up in the area where you retrieve your gear (as a weeper), or is that randomized in some way?
Also, assassinating a Tallboy with just your sword is tricky as hell, but pretty rewarding when you pull it off. It has that really stylish animation for it too :)
If you brand the Overseer, he’s either one of the weepers (Low Chaos), or the weeper (High Chaos) in the room where Corvo can get his possessions back. At the bottom of the shaft Daud threw them into.
You’ve got it backward.
If branded, Campbell is the only weeper at the bottom on Low Chaos, and one of multiple on High Chaos.
Crap. You’re right. My mistake.
Shamus, if you actually watch the Assassin train the other one, the things he says are a direct reference to the things the Keepers tell Garrett in Thief: The Dark Project during the tutorial. That whole room is a reference to Thief.
I’m a little disappointed you missed that. Shame on you!
I’m disappointed that given how much MST3K he’s watched, he’s never made a “Plot Convenience Playhouse presents” quote during one of those expository guard conversations.
Or “incredibly specific plot point news”
I don’t remember you ruining a lot of the talking head sequences in Fallout 3… where you’re rooted to the ground, and then force fed idiotic exposition… I can’t remember if you figured out how to ruin Andrew Ryan’s golf game in Bioshock, either, for that matter…
So basically, if Josh is given agency, he acts dumb.
Sounds about right.
I must say, I really like the muffled voices of the whalers. They’re like Victorian Cyberpunk’s answer to G22.
I realize that i have seen all of the children’s shows that have been mentioned in this episode and the last one. It makes me feel weird. Very weird.
“Is there any tense, serious moment I can't ruin with abject silliness and stupidity?”
Ruin?Dont you mean improve?
Seeing how jumping on someones head affects them in this game makes me really sad about bioshock and all my attempts to jump on someone,only for them to be as immobile as the ground.
Tried to find the video where you see the assassins train,and failed.Watched a few lets plays where guys simply rush trough,or see the beginning of the sequence and just say “Screw it,lets gut them”.That makes me sad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nh40JkcWzRE
The first video hit on the keywords “dishonored thief reference”.
Shamus, shamefur dispray for not picking up on that.
Pffft. I’ve repeated the missions many times over the years, but I don’t think I’ve done the tutorial since the game was new. So… 1998 or so? Yeah. Not surprised I don’t remember that.
But, but, but….
But the developer quotes is the best part of the Dark Project! How can you miss out on that comedy gold?
Ahh, I didn’t even remember you could skip it, I’m pretty sure I’ve played it in all my playthroughs but I most often do tutorials even if I’m replaying the game for some odd reason.
Eh, it’s not that odd. You’re not typically going to play the same game twice in a row, and if it’s been a while you may remember roughly how a game works but not exactly, or just need to get back in the groove. The only real reason not to play it is if it’s too slow for you as just a refresher.
I would sooner destroy a stained glass window than an artist like yourself.
But, since I can’t have you following me….*brick to the face*
This level really reminds me of the one down in the tunnels right after Nova Prospekt in HL2. And not in a good way.
It was well designed, sort of interesting, but it was largely non-plot-advancing fill that followed one “major importance to the plot” mission without following it thematically, and didn’t really do anything to set up the next “major importance to the plot” mission. It’s just sorta there.
Sorry, to be clear, that was “the level after the fight with Daud,” (the second half of the episode) not the part with Daud. The part with Daud rules.
Huh. Given how Daud could’ve immediately teleported away when Corvo had him cornered, I get the feeling that he chose to stay there to face Corvo’s judgement.
hah, yeah this stood out for me in a slightly jarring way! But I agree, he’s defeated in a physical *and* psychological way, so it makes sense that he wouldn’t have the strength but to just lie there and try to seek closure (be it by death and/or coming to terms) from the only equal he has left after so many Outsider-powered assasinations.
He’d clearly already used up his last vial of Pierro’s Spiritual Remedy.
Yeah, but he waits way longer than he needs to for his mana to recharge by itself.
It is worth noting Daud is immune to many things, but counter-kills are not one of them.
Pull one off and he dies instantly. No speech, just a crumpled heap.
I kept reloading to not accidentally counter-kill him as it felt unfair, and a swordfight seemed fitting, well it did after what I saw he did when he catches you.
Actually, Cambell (if you didn’t kill him) is at the bottom of the factory where Daud dumps your stuff. Complete with a note he wrote to himself about how sad he is and how much he hates Corvo.
Unless it’s another thing the game randomizes.
No. That one is not randomized. He always appears at the refinery.
There’s a book on Doud’s shelf about the Royal Protector and how a ruler choosing one is a big deal because, among other things, it’s a life-long deal. It talks about how, in the final choosing process, a ruler makes the decision who the protector is suppose to be by age 12.
Reading that, I got the impression that Corvo and Jessamine were childhood friends. Perhaps I’m wrong and Corvo could be much older than the empress, but even so it further hints at a relationship that we NEVER SEE.
It makes me ache for this stuff so badly.
Also, on my (current) low-chaos playthrough, I actually ran through this area killing the assassins with the obvious intent of doing the same to Doud. Then I heard his little speech sneaking in on him. Sigh. Darn you, man. I ended up sparing him after messing around with saves.
I did not once see the conversation where he asks you to spare him though. He just died and vanished for me (when I was fooling around in the area). Whoa.
Nope, they are the same age as that is how the Lord Protector system works, and if you poke around the loyalists’ logs and conversations they do a lot of wondering to that relationship…
Corvo probably ends up the exception to usual Lord Protector rule as he ends up being Emily’s simply because he outlives his original royal member and Emily is younger than the normal age for picking one by the time she takes the throne. The fact he is likely single most capable bodyguard in the world by this point too probably doesn’t hurt, as he already had a fearsome reputation before The Outsider got involved.
We also know that he’s plenty capable without Outsider powers because he escaped the most heavily guarded prison in Dunwall almost by himself, without the aid of magic powers.
I think that escape scene is partially a tutorial and partially a way to show that Corvo is skilled. Considering how out of practice he had to have been, escaping Coolridge would’ve been difficult for any other person in the same situation.
…and the part where the guards mention Corvo used to do sparring practice with the Watch, whole groups of them.
Emily’s off-hand remark at the start about teaching her to climb things as well.
Wow, that was an interesting battle with Daud. Can you fight him and still somehow “ghost” the level?
You can assassinate him, with some good timing, and ghost the level in that way. But if you want the full, face-to-face battle, then that ruins the Ghost achievement.
Thanks. The wiki says the targets don’t count if they see you; but since there are other assassins teleporting in, it wouldn’t count as ghosting.
In one of Daud’s notes, he states that his assassin underlings are powered by him. In exchange for being loyal to Daud, the Whalers get some of his powers, like the teleporting and the tractor beams.
In the DLC it’s elaborated on. Daud can only bestow his abilities on certain people. Those that are unable to, yet still want to serve Daud, are given other duties like mastering the act of developing poisons and other tasks that assist the assassins in their job.
Josh’s skill with the crossbow is really pretty hit and miss, isn’t it?
That’s a rather precise way of putting it, aye.
I’d say bullseye.
So I’m not sure if it was in this episode or the last one that Josh got the throwing arm bone charm, but I just got it myself in my “completely insane madman kills everything in sight” play of Dishonored, and I’ve found two uses for it that Josh might not have realized.
Firstly, if you hurl a bit of junk at someone then it puts them off guard for a moment, which is long enough to critical-kill them in a fight. Not particularly useful when facing multiple people but hilarious when you kill one or two guards by blindsiding them with the disembodied limb of their best friend first. I went through the whole of the Distillery District portion of the Golden Cat mission by alternately hammering people with the same guardsman’s left arm and stabbing them in the gut, until I accidentally threw it away by beaning a weeper with it and sending her hurtling off the edge of a bridge to her watery death.
Loads of fun, doesn’t really require throwing arm. The second and more important use is that you can plant spring razors on any viable surface, including throwable objects. You can’t pick up a whole corpse with a spring razor on it (you’ll just automatically remove the razor from the corpse) but you can grab up a head or torso with one or more attached to it. Even better, if your razor grenade’s base object is breakable, it’ll set off all the razors attached to it once it hits. With throwing arm, it becomes an increased range, no delay, area of effect razor death ball that trumps grenades handily. I’m pretty sure with enough razors you could effectively snipe Daud with it.
Aaaand that’s my rant on why throwing arm is situationally useful if you’re a murderous psycho. Not sure why I made it, but it was fun.
The “nameless” lady in the floodlands (that Josh accidentally head-stomped) who has the more interesting character development actually does has a name. It’s Alfa. That letter on the bed Josh flashed through while she was talking was addressed to her.
I think Daud is a little more justified thinking that his pouch going missing is Corvo, considering that he knows Corvo passed through about the same time it went missing.
Also, I think it’s pretty funny that some of you guys couldn’t remember Cecilia, considering that’s the reason she survives the massacre at the Hound Pits. (Havelock forgot she existed)