Those locked doors aren't the doors you're looking for. Those are just a shortcut to every floor that open on the outside so you wouldn't have to bother wasting 3/4 of the day getting to the bottom floor. Rather convenient, as it also allowed me to scout floors I haven't got to yet.
edited 14th Jan '10 11:39:42 AM by Cliche
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Perhaps I'll try going down there again on my next run. For now, it's SUPER DYNAMIC COOKING TIME! 1
Episode 7: Mundane Adventures In Cooking
Day 10 of Spring is relatively quiet. Thanks to Mist and Erik's requests, Raguna wakes up with turnips on the brain. Luckily for him, it's just the right time for his next set of turnips to be harvested. He saves a pair to give to Anette so that they can be mailed off to their destinations (even though Raguna and Mist are practically neighbors, as are he and Erik).
After trying to run alongside Anette to Mist's house upon realization that he had only given her one of the turnips (that she had postmarked for Erik), he handes the other one to her just as she was giving Mist her mail. At least she's got it now, Raguna thinks to himself.
Back at his own mailbox, Raguna receives a letter from Selphy, and a note about the mild climate in the Green Ruins, which would seem like the perfect place to grow spring-time vegetables underground. For the time being, he concentrates on mining for more iron in the Whale Island cave, as bamboo shoots and other materials are lacking today.
When he finishes with his cave exploration, Raguna goes to the library to visit Selphy, who has cleaned up a bit of the mess she made when she first moved in. She even had time to organize the books she was finished reading so that she could sell them to Raguna! How nice of her. One such book is a recipe on how to make "hot pot" meals, which Raguna immediately snatches up for a rather small fee.
Erik is thankful that he got his turnip by mail that he gives Raguna a growth formula, guaranteed to make one of his crops grow three days faster. (Plants on steroids? The DEA ought to investigate this guy).
With the remainder of his time, Raguna goes off to Lake Poli to shake down a few of the orchard trees for their cherries, and then decides to sell them. While the cherries are indeed tasty, the health 2 benefits don't really justify keeping them around without a decent recipe to use them for. Mmm...cherry pie...
What Raguna does have a recipe for, however, is pickled turnips...and a few other things. He then recalls the recipe book he bought from Selphy and heads over to Rita to get some other ingredients (milk, eggs, flour, and all that good stuff). Much like the pickled turnips he had been making, the pot recipes are simple and only require a few ingredients. He's already had a bit of practice, so the boiled milk, udon noodles, and egg bowl come out without much difficulty.
Tomorrow's agenda: back to the Green Ruins to find out a way to get through (or around) those locked doors, because climbing the beanstalk to the Whale Island cave takes time.
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Episode 8: The Roundabout Approach
In retrospect, Raguna probably shouldn't have used Erik's super-special-awesome growth formula on his strawberries right away, as they were already ready to grow by the next day. Whoops. At least they'll fit nicely in the shipping bin along with the two patches of turnips.
Mist sends her thanks for the turnip via hedgehog-mail. She seems a bit confused about sending letters for such a simple task, which is a departure from the norm.
Raguna decides that he's going to try something different today...do all of his dungeon-running before taking care of the crops. Before that, he decides to pray at the church for good luck. Erik is there, who sells him some old dog-and-pony story about crops turning into monsters and trashing your fields if you try to harvest them past their grow-by date. He ignore it and tests out a different tidbit that turns out to be true: Lara really likes the taste of strawberries.
A return visit to the Green Ruins gives Raguna an opportunity to do some turnip-planting. The caves do see a little light every now and then (at least on the first level, since it's close to the entrance), so it wouldn't be totally implausible to expect things to grow down there.
Raguna then works his way around the first floor of the dungeon and to a different set of stairs than the ones he saw closer to the entrance. He laughs off the acorn attacks being hurled at him by the squirrels, but gets zapped by paralyzing spores from a roving plant. Luckily, there's a treasure chest nearby that contains an antidote that cures him of just that. (As the esteemed scholar Vitale
would say, "Serendipity, baby!" 1) He heads down to B2 and unlocks the door from the other side so that he doesn't have to do as much backtracking the next time he goes down. By the time he does this, however, it's almost 4 PM, so he has to exit and visit the bath house (oh, and there's also that little insignificant thing called "farming" he does later).
At the bath house, he gives Melody an orange herb, and she's most surprised that he remembered her birthday. Nobody had even told him about it... 2
During her distribution run, Rosetta reveals that she, too, loves the taste of strawberries. She starts to take a few for herself, but changes her mind.
Just before going to bed, Raguna puts his culinary skills to the test by concocting some high-level foodstuffs (berry jam, hot chocolate, etc.) so that he won't go hungry for his next dungeon run.
The next day brings about the first rain Raguna's seen since his arrival. The good news is that he doesn't have to water the plants, and can go straight to the dungeon.
He heads downstairs to B2 using the shortcut he found when he first discovered the ruins. He doesn't get very far in, as he's attacked by a pair of mushrooms who spray him with spores that slow him down and give him a nasty cloud of...something. I check the status screen, and it indicates that this mystery ailment Raguna has acquired is "Exhaustion", which doubles RP consumption unless cured with Cold Medicine. Raguna takes a set of cold pills he packed just for this journey and...nothing happens. His health is dangerously low at this point, so he exists and lumbers toward the infirmary in hopes of getting some TLC from Lara, only to find that his exhaustion and paralysis have both worn off in just under an hour.
The rest of the day is uneventful, since the weather has forced everyone inside, and the rain has done Raguna's job of watering the lawn for him.
Hooray! We've completed two slightly profitable weeks here on Kaldia Farm, so let's take a look at how our young hero has grown since then, hm?
Level: 10
Weapons: 22
Farming: 18
Lumber: 11
Hammer: 13
Cooking: 12
Forging: 6
It seems Raguna has gotten quite skilled with both sword and plow in just two weeks. It helps that you still get practical experience just for swinging the damn things around.
As for his luck with the ladies? His love level with Mist is at one, and the same with Selphy is approaching 1. Not quite the lady-killer yet, but give him some time.
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Taller than Zim
So, what girl are you going for?
"No, the Singularity will not happen. Computation is hard." -Happy Ent
Responsible adult
Ahh, I love rain. Always so useful!
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
@Arilou: Haven't really decided yet. Mist would be the obvious and easy choice because of her past connection with Raguna and affinity to Turnips. Then again, I married Melody in the original Rune Factory because all it took to get on her good side was to visit the bath house every day (of course, after we shacked up, I couldn't go back there again since she lived at my place now).
Right now, I'm leaning toward Lara, but I've only seen a little more than half of my pool of potential admirers (her, Mist, Rosetta, Selphy, Eunice, Anette, and Melody). Still waiting for at least two of the following girls to show up before I make my final decision: Bianca, Tabitha, Uzuki, Cinnamon and the Iris twins.
edited 20th Jan '10 8:29:29 AM by WillyFourEyes
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Responsible adult
Dayum, there's a lot of bachelorettes in that game!
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Yep. If you count Iris as two people, then that's a baker's dozen right there.
I'd like to see a playthrough/Let's Play/fanfic wherein someone enacts a Twin Threesome Fantasy with Rags and Iris.
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Responsible adult
Iris... two people? *goes to look up on Game FA Qs*
*whistles* Geez. So she's analgous to Keira from DS in difficulty, from the looks of it... or maybe Skye, who had six heart events as opposed to the usual four, all of which were in two parts.
edited 20th Jan '10 11:53:48 AM by FreezairForALimitedTime
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
I'd never even seen Keira in HM DS, but I'd imagine the whole "being a mermaid" thing would kinda get in the way of finding a suitor (one certain Disney Princess notwithstanding).
edited 20th Jan '10 1:25:19 PM by WillyFourEyes
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Really, the Formula C is only useful for those long-growing flowers, and even then one isn't going to do you much favour.
I recall that Mist was initially one of my first choices as well, but later on her, um, persistence put me off her as a significant other. She's still really amusing, regardless, just not in a way I'd like to marry her for.
edited 20th Jan '10 3:26:09 PM by Cliche
Responsible adult
You're confusing Keria and Leia.
Leia: Mermaid; lives in Darryl's basement.
Keira: Ancient princess; lives in a bed on the 255th floor of the 3rd mine.
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Oops. You're right. 
Haven't found her, either.
edited 20th Jan '10 4:16:31 PM by WillyFourEyes
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Responsible adult
Leia's pretty easy. Just give colored grasses to Daryl until he lets you into his basement.
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Episode 9: Fleeting Formal Foreigners
Lute's gonna be back in town, so it looks like a "farm first" day. Armed with his mighty watering can, axe and sickle, Raguna goes to work on ridding his lawn of the scourge of stray branches, rocks and weeds.
Later on, he goes to the library and finds that Lute isn't the only one peddling his wares today. He decides to add books on fried dishes, potion-making, and weaponcrafting to his small but growing collection, and then gets the facilities from Lute to actually make use of those books. Lute won't, however, sell Raguna the blender because his house is too small. (Classist.)
Entering the inn, Raguna crashes into a girl wearing an exquisitely Asian outfit, with bells and those weird white feather things that look like antennae but aren't. She's got a flying sidekick with her, who starts out by calls himself the Musashi Yamatokami... before she cuts him off. She speaks very formally, and asks Raguna if she "abides here". After he answers in the affirmative, she asks for his help, and then goes outside. He spends the next several hours looking around town for the stranger, but never finds her.
Miffed that he just wasted most of his day chasing after a girl he barely knows *, Raguna heads back home to his new lab to start working on some medicine. He is able to brew up a few antidotes and paralysis remedies, but nothing more complex than that. With his new book on forging weapons, he decides to give his broadsword a boost by infusing it with Water Crystal essence, giving him a neat-looking Aquablade.
Thus ends Day 13 of the spring, Year 1. I wonder where in the world that girl disappeared to...
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Responsible adult
I like the "Stalk-O-Meter" that Tree of Tranquility/Animal Parade give you. You know where any NPC is, any time!
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
I used to use it, but it never really did me any good, because I was always off doing something else at the same time, and I never got around to talking to the girl I was trying to stalk charm.
Responsible adult
I used it to help figure out schedules, so it helped me a lot.
Yay?
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Episode 10: You've Got the Spirit In You (or: Willy Four Eyes' Most Productive Day So Far)
Day 14 begins with another round of turnip harvesting and a letter from Marco, challenging Raguna to get stronger so that he and Marco can have an epic sword duel. Aren't kids' dreams a funny thing?
After cleaning up his farm a bit, Raguna goes to the business district, where strangely-Asian girl is standing outside the inn practicing with her spear. The floating guy is angry that Raguna ran off, even though she was the one who asked to meet him outside and never showed up afterward. She apologizes and introduces herself as Uzuki and her partner/caretaker as Tsubute. He doesn't want him flirting with her, hs eshe says that she doesn't mind.
At around the same time, Anette announces that she's completed her delivery run, and hints that she could go for a pumpkin tart. It's a bit early in the year for Raguna to grow any, so she'll just have to wait until the fall.
He wanders over to the library to pick up a fine dining cookbook from Selphy. Looking at some of the recipes, it doesn't appear that he's got enough materials to make them, but he holds on to it for later anyway.
From there, Raguna goes to the clock tower to have a chat with Kanno, who mentions that his granddaughters are on his way here to help take care of him. He laments not having anyone around to give him food, so Raguna gives him some homemade bamboo rice to try and cheer him up.
As Raguna leaves the tower, two girls fall on top of him from above. The short one is named Candy, and the taller one with glasses is named Cinnamon. (She's shy.) Candy tells him that Kanno is their grandfather.
Candy tells Raguna about a Spirit song, one where you can speak directly to the spirits and make Rune Wonders. Rune Wonders apparently do things like changing the weather or speeding the growth of plants. Candy belts out a song (full of "la"s), and tells him that it produced bamboo shoots for his field. She also tells him that it'll take Runeys in order for her to make miracles. Cinnamon says that the reason they fell was because Candy was trying to get the Wind spirits to carry them.
A new grocery store has opened up next to Danny's place. Rosetta is in charge of it, and it sells mostly flower seeds, which are way out of Raguna's price range, even on a good day.
He explores a bit more of B2 of the Green Ruins for some more materials to ship, and eventually finds a stairway to B3 (but doesn't make it far enough to reach the series of staircases close to the entrance. When it hits 4 PM, he exits, and finds Candy by the lake next to Mist's house talking to Marco. She gives Raguna a Harvester for gathering Runeys that she can use to produce Rune Wonders, or for helping make his field more prosperous.
Her sister, Cinnamon, is fishing at the river outside Raguna's house. She asks him if he likes to fish, too, and gives him her old fishing pole to help him get started.
Kanno wants Raguna to find a Cheap Cloth for him. He runs home to pick from his collection of Cheap Cloths that he mined from enemies earlier in the week, and in return, Kanno gives him a Fire Rod. With it, even someone as non-magcally inclined as Raguna can use magic with it. He and Cinnamon are wizards, though, meaning he won't get to be as good as them without the proper training.
At around 7:30 PM, after he's collected his money for the day, he goes to the bath house and overhears Lara freaking out about the temperature of the water in the hot spring.
He does some weapon synthesis at home, and then goes to sleep, justifiably tired from all the running around he did today.
edited 23rd Jan '10 2:12:07 PM by WillyFourEyes
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Responsible adult
Woo! Stuff!
"Cinnamon" is a weird name.
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
Yeah. Sounds very porn star-ish.
Episode 11: Raguna and the Chitterling
The grass patch next to Raguna's farm has finally grown in, meaning he can have animals/monsters on his farm, either to fight for him or pick up vegetables. Here, grass has a shorter growth cycle than in other games (grows in five days, and can be re-harvested every other day), so it's rare that Raguna's monsters will go hungry, unless he neglects them in the winter.
Today's letters are a welcome letter from Cinnamon, and a greeting letter from Rosetta to come and shop at her store, "Materia". Already, I can think of one thing wrong with that title...
Yesterday's Rune Wonder song from Candy has produced additional bamboo shoots on the field, just like she said. You can tell that they're hers because they're glowing with Runeys. There isn't any difference in quality between these and other bamboo shoots, though.
On to the Green Ruins we go. The turnips Raguna planted a few days ago near the entrance are almost ready to grow.
Instead of cutting down the vines like he normally does (these suckers regrow quickly), Raguna takes out his Fire Rod and burns that sucker down. He tries the same against the blue portal where the first squirrel-like thing emerged, but can't quite get his aim properly, so he just smacks it to death.
The squirrel monster is still chasing and tossing acorns at Raguna, so he decides to break out his secret weapon for dealing with annoying monsters...a Pet Glove (which, in this game, is not a glove at all, but your standard animal petting brush.) The creature, which we will learn is called a Chitter (which Rags names "Chit"), is brushed back to Raguna's farm using the power of shock and "awww". Given some time, he'll have a few extra hands to help him around the farm.
To celebrate his new acquisition, he goes around and does some completely un-monster-related shopping, such as picking up a book on jewelry (to help boost his forging skills) and some moon drop flowers (they're the only ones he can afford now; a few of the seeds at Rosetta's shop are said to be "more valuable than gold").
Also on Raguna's "goofing off" agenda: a little bit of fishing. He tries a few different spots, and has a bit of trouble getting the timing right, but manages to catch a small trout near his farm. He shows it off to Cinnamon, who shows her gratitude (as much as she can, anyway.)
Her grandfather, Kanno, is in the market for a sharp fang. Ragua hasn't come across any monsters that would drop such an item, so he writes it down for later.
The next day, Raguna takes Chit down to the Green Ruins with him for a "power walk". This basically involves killing monsters and throwing acorns at them, though not in that order. The turnip patch near the entrance has grown, and has brought one of those shiny light orbs with it. It doesn't respond to Raguna's harvester, but when he walks through it, he feels somewhat refreshed. He plants the moondrop flowers he bought at Rosetta's yesterday for good measure.
Later on, he visits Erik at his farm, who tells him that the harvester is also useful for gathering materials from animals themselves (milk, eggs, wool, and what-have-you).
The rest of the day is spent fishing and making accessories. Raguna's big catch of the day is a 57 cm trout.
edited to fix a Freudian Slippery Trope
edited 24th Jan '10 4:55:48 PM by WillyFourEyes
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Of course, gold in this game is common in certain locations and sells for comparatively little, so that doesn't say much. Nonetheless, those flowers you were talking about, Emery Flowers, are indeed valuable since those things are necessary to make the accessories that block all Standard Status Effects. Your Mileage May Vary on whether it's worth all the trouble, but that's just an example of how the long-growing flowers get made into the advanced weapons and accessories (don't ask me how that makes sense).
It'll be interesting to see the friendship between man and squirrel grow, especially since something nice happens as it becomes more friendly with you.
edited 24th Jan '10 4:47:04 PM by Cliche
I have seen the amateur, and it is me.
I don't expect my little Chitter friend to do much around the farm right away. It's still small, and its main skill is picking up vegetables, of which I don't have much. For the time being, I'll bring it along to battle with me. It gets lonely in those dungeons...
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!
Responsible adult
Is there any more touching sight in all the world than a boy and his monster squirrel?
"Proto-Indo-European makes the damnedest words related. It's great. It's the Kevin Bacon of etymology." ~Madrugada
Sorry about that. This entry came out extra-long, because I wanted to inspect the Green Ruins on the day I found it, but didn't have the energy to do so (meaning that I wound up doing two days' work)
. Turns out there's not much to it at this point in the game (damn locked doors). I'll try to keep the rest of them below 1,000 words from now on.
I hope you get tiny bits of eggshell in all your omelettes for the rest of your life!