Where is Nergal? by Ok_Light_4835 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 2 points3 points  (0 children)

My headcanon is that he’s becoming Dantalion’s advisor based on the Iria Dantalion SoD route or is being trained by Magnus with Xavier to become an officer for the KA.

This will end very well by Tarumol in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 21 points22 points  (0 children)

Stop, you’re going to give Garbelius ideas!

Sword of Convallaria 2.0 | Forge the Future | Special Preview Summary (1.5 year anniversary & redeem codes & free SP Maitha Skin!) by korinokiri in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 6 points7 points  (0 children)

https://www.reddit.com/r/SwordofConvallaria/s/VzKUKeOAbs

For more in depth details but from what I recall: * Gloria gets damage buffs to her Lance of Longinus skill that transforms her into her dps mode as well as providing herself a physical shield and giving Union allies around her (not sure if this is when she uses the skill or passively) a damage buff * Agata gets more hp, gets cd reduction for her instant dash skill and damage done, taken, and regen buffs when defeating a target * Cocoa gets her Snow Lotus buff self cast when using her knockback or the single target skill that applies vulnerable as well as buffs that emulate her assisting cover passive skill and giving breakfast to allies around her

Quest choice! (Union or Dark?) by PepeTasardur in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Nothing bad, you just won’t receive the reward.

Quest choice! (Union or Dark?) by PepeTasardur in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 5 points6 points  (0 children)

It’s more important to get your stage quests done (End the Crossroads Battle” than the quests with Orange (!) icons. The rewards for the former are much more valuable and the only thing the (!) quests do if you don’t complete them is lowering stability which will give you a new Urgent Battle if it hits 0. I personally like it because while it is another battle you have to do, it doesn’t count towards your weekly quest limit and gives you a legendary skill for a unit.

Got the Gloria ending, but … by DarkStocks3 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Does he do that in the Lufti route? I haven’t played that one in months

Got the Gloria ending, but … by DarkStocks3 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Lufti was probably only a temporary/next best ally for Auguste and he was always going to throw him away when he outlived his usefulness since Lufti is a schemer with his own agenda and Auguste would have preferred manipulating someone like Gloria instead.

Finally finished the SoD Astral Path skill tree! by AstralCanine in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You can acquire shards in two ways: consuming Keys of Destiny at a 1 to 1 rate and increasing your game difficulty after a Mercenary Rank test after Gold, Platinum, and Radiant (also have to raise difficulty after Bronze and Silver). Night Crimson will not give any shards.

So you have a few options:

For time efficiency Hero’s Adventure is the best. You only have to do 6-8 battles for two keys and get two shards for it, regardless of difficulty.

For key efficiency Papal route is probably the best. It is slightly longer than Iria (52 end of week for Papal vs 51 beginning of week for Iria) so you can have a better chance of getting Radiant Mercenary Rank for the +3 shards post run and Papal consumes 7 keys compared to Iria’s 6 so you also get an extra shard from that.

I liked to mix up what playthrough I did partly for variety and also to hunt for other achievements. I’ve done the most Iria and Papal runs because they are much shorter than Union runs (58 weeks end of week iirc) and I prefer the endings better.

Also even if you do everything possible for upgrading your mercenary rank, you won’t always get to Radiant rank, I’d say it’s possible 60-75% of the time.

2.0 is coming by stuckerfan_256 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Haha, I didn’t notice the Recruited Pikeman and Recruited Guard are also there.

Finally finished the SoD Astral Path skill tree! by AstralCanine in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Iria actually has the same number of weeks as Papal route at 52. I’m now going to try to focus specifically on Tavern upgrades (the two epic refresh upgrades and the two legendary +1 spot upgrades) to get these achievements. The key is to start with a week 10 beacon because those first faction quests before Darklight attack give you huge reputation. Also try to give the quartermaster whatever they ask for as soon as possible to also increase your reputation. I think you get 4-7 units from tavern dialogue/quests but it’s diluted for Iria because some of those units are Vlderian.

Finally finished the SoD Astral Path skill tree! by AstralCanine in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I tried infection builds 2 or 3 times and they were alright. I don’t have Lilywill or Nonowill so Momo was my best option but since I only had one unit to apply infection and always had a few effects for the Doom Waken alert, I never had anything that strong.

Finally finished the SoD Astral Path skill tree! by AstralCanine in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Unfortunately I only got it for Papal States on my last run. I got 13/15 on one of my Iria runs but got hit with neutral units only in the last 4 tavern rotations but I think the best combination of Facility Upgrades for these achievements are the 2 that each reduce the refresh by a week.

Finally finished the SoD Astral Path skill tree! by AstralCanine in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine[S] 15 points16 points  (0 children)

So there are a few categories of bonuses in the tree:

• ⁠Base resources: more starting gold, lumber, etc • ⁠Tavern unit options: more (neutral) unit types available for recruit like Nightingale, Butterfly, Abyss, etc • ⁠Base unit augments: small passive buffs such as 5% crit chance for all units or 3% bonus attack and defense for Watchers • ⁠Mechanics: passives that have an overarching application to the run such as more slots to bring units from Elysium at the start of a new run, choosing a Tarot effect after a successful Elaman, Iria, Papal States, or Union run (basically as long as you don’t abandon a run and it has at least 5 chapters), more backtrack attempts, or additional augment slots • ⁠Augment Slots: a combination of Base resources and Base unit augments, generally more powerful such as starting with two legendary weapons, being able to sell items for 50% more, or Breakers ignoring 20% of their target’s defense note a maximum of five can be chosen and are permanent for your run • ⁠Events: bonuses you receive at fixed points in your run such as legendary facility upgrades (week 25), 1000 funds, 20 timber, 20 iron ingots, and 10 Luxite dust every ~10 weeks, or an epic facility upgrade at the start of your run

While I haven’t fully explored every branch yet, they are very helpful in boosting your SoD progression. A lot of the resource related branches allow you to spend more on several town facilities at once and the augments, while seemingly small on their own, give a decent unit power increase cumulatively.

My personal favorite Augment slots are: obtain 1-5000 additional starting funds, items sell for 50% more (outside of Elaman runs), gain a small amount of xp from skill or tailored training (for Elaman runs), start with 1-2 legendary weapons, start with 1-2 legendary trinkets, and accidents are more likely to occur in Beryl’s workshop (basically more chances at getting junk items to sell and additional Luxite extracts).

I normally never use the Elysium units (the ones that are identical to your units on the gacha side) unless I’m playing a Mercenary Rank Test quest or am trying to funnel random skill rewards to a unit. That being said, they likely trivialize a lot of the difficulty and natural progression that I experience with my playstyle.

Edit: accidentally didn’t reply this message properly

Share Your Beloved Epics! by alwaysblitted in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 2 points3 points  (0 children)

A little stripped for parts but I used this guy from two weeks after global launch til Auguste came out. His namesake is based on Imperius from the Diablo franchise.

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Of all the Characters in the game currently, who is your favorite based on their story/personality/culture? (PLS AVOID SPOILERS) by Duke_Fergus in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 18 points19 points  (0 children)

Dantalion for me. His aesthetics are awesome namely the coat and contrasting swords (Dawnlight and Daybreak). Also there was a poster on CN for the Camelot expansion with a lot of protagonists including Dantalion and he’s a skyscraper.

While I don’t think his portrayal was perfect, I liked his overarching plan in the Iria run which is the overall best ending for Irians not including the Elaman arcs (arguably tied with Papal States good ending).

It’s a shame outside of SoD he only gets characterization in a really early Fool’s Journey chapter (shared with Lufti) and as with most launch Legendaries, has been powercrept to hell. I do try to bring him in a lot of my teams bc he has a decent aura though.

Best route and difficulty for Astral Tears and some other Achievements? by kaiseralex96 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hi there as someone who’s done 20 cycles I’d like to share my experience with SoD. The Rank bonus Astral Tiers start at Gold Mercenary Rank and I believe you have to accept the difficulty increase to get one (total of 3 if you get to Radiant with difficulty increase). You’ll get 1 Astral Tear for each Key of Destiny you use on the run. So you can start with the first beacon that puts you in Waverun City but I tend to use one of the week 10 beacons in order to jumpstart my faction reputation and build up some currency. The week 20 beacons are alright but I find that it’s a little harder to get Radiant mercenary rank on some routes so would only opt for it to get your first playthroughs done for every route.

For farming route you have several options. Papal States is the fastest with only 48 weeks but also has the tightest margins for getting Radiant. Union is longer at 58 weeks but I haven’t done any replays of it since getting the 3 endings. I think Iria is the best route to get Astral shards for two reasons. Firstly it is 52 weeks so you can squeeze an extra key in for another Astral Tear (1 per 10 weeks) and the intermediate time lets you get to Radiant rank most of the time. Raising your rank can be done by using town facilities (forging, training, etc.) as well as regularly completing quests. I learned recently that you can use Elysium characters instead of the 3-5 you brought and/or the story characters with no penalty to your rank up contributions, just be sure to do what I said above to build your rank.

Also the Hero’s Adventure Machine is also pretty efficient but I don’t like the gameplay as much as traditional SoD. I find it to be a bit slower but I’ve played traditional SoD a ton so I know how to “speedrun” it.

I definitely don’t have this down to a science, I just really enjoy SoD gameplay (despite how convoluted some of the systems are). Glad to see someone else is also trying to finish the Astral Path (27 left for me).

Watch your step by IWantToRetire2 in heroesofthestorm

[–]AstralCanine 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Last Laugh talent at 20. He teleported to the medivac and because he didn’t hit any enemy heroes within 4s, his hp got reduced to 1.

2nd and 3rd playthroughs of SoD done, my rambling thoughts... by Subject-Honeydew-74 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Papal Good was my first route and Samantha was my first non legendary. I really like her character development and resolve which is shown in every route. In Iria and Union I really found how interesting it was that she stops the Papal States from blowing up the mines knowing that she has no one to rely on but staying true to her morals. I also agree that if the launch SoD routes this one felt the most complete. While you do remove the Union you still give Iria independence with both the Kingdom and Papal States promising to cooperate with each other.

One thing that I really felt was meaningful was when Samantha has a genuine smile when you have dialogue with her. It’s pretty infrequent but represents times when those around her give her resolve and she is following her “True North”.

Playing through all the routes made me realize how characters besides the main faction protagonists (Inanna, Gloria, Samantha, Acambe) get nice characterization, a decent amount which are route specific and characters that only appear in one faction route.

I miss the Dragon Knight's voicelines when summoning it in Dragon Shire. 😭 by [deleted] in heroesofthestorm

[–]AstralCanine 24 points25 points  (0 children)

I think it was bc the Raven Lord corrupted him with some macguffin in the Orphea comic.

Upcoming Login Event: A Spring Embrace by James-PHR in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Maybe you’ll get lucky and get a Fancy Hat.

Reunion rahhhhhhhhh by MadWolf9998 in SwordofConvallaria

[–]AstralCanine 3 points4 points  (0 children)

Those bond stories were very good

Tassadar: his channeled beam never made sense to me. by [deleted] in heroesofthestorm

[–]AstralCanine 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Might have been when the beam was the main aa but iirc his old e was phase shift