#mizufa

S1’s setting was, despite becoming their tangible reality, a MMO. Aside from the loss of the mini-map as well as the physical interaction with the environment, everything was very much like it was when Elder Tale was an MMO. Then, the Adventurers realized that they had a much larger impact on this world. They discovered Overskills like Real Food Preparation and Magical Engineering, which vastly improved the quality of life for both Adventurers and Landers alike. The main conflicts were about getting Adventurers adjusted to their situation and dealing with MMO events gone awry. Large-scale political conflicts were, in hindsight, a very small part of S1. The battles that the characters fought in followed MMO rules closely, so most of the tried-and-true strategies continued to work in S1.

S2 shows us the results of the Adventurers’ actions in S1, whether we saw them (Akiba) or not (Minami). Furthermore, as the world of Theldesia begins reflecting more of the real world, it becomes less bound to MMO rules — or in the case of flavor text, too bound to MMO rules. As we saw with the Abyssal Shaft raid, raid bosses no longer are mindless, solitary monsters. They’re now capable of forming tactics, taking advantage of the situation, and manipulating the odds in their favor. Krusty and Misa, before her scythe went awry, noted that the goblins were holding training camps. The monsters are gaining sentience, and that means that the tried-and-true tactics that could be used in S1 might not necessarily work anymore. Or, even if they worked, it might become much more time-consuming because the enemy could figure out a counter, like how Ruseato stabbed itself to spawn Shadow Vanguard in order to attack the Abyssal Shaft team.

Also, Lander politics takes a much larger role in this season. As we’ve seen with Plant Hwyaden, Westelande’s nobles have an influence on the guild’s decisions, and they want to take advantage of the Adventurers’ innovations in order to wage war on Eastal. The Adventurers find their innovations and discoveries to be more convenient than anything; in Minami, they developed prototype tanks and armored trains. While the Adventurers think little of it, Mizufa and the other nobles found tremendous potential in them. It’s a parallel to science and the military in the real world: while many scientists just discover for the sake of discovery, it’s the military leaders who utilize their potential to cause greater devastation and, hopefully, lead to their victory. Mizufa took advantage of the fact that the Catastrophe “broke” some MMO conventions by having the Lander sorcerers use EXP Pots, which are normally only used by Adventurers. Using that in conjunction with her new and improved vehicles, she unleashed all those Nightshades in order to spark a war with Eastal.

Some people have been wondering why Nyanta wasn’t going to defend the village, and that’s because he was trying to cut off the problem from its source. For the kids, there’s no time to form a coherent strategy for two main reasons: too many enemies, and too few members. The Odyssea Knights are obviously unwilling to cooperate with them, because all they want to do is commit suicide against the monsters to get a glimpse of the real world, and Mizufa’s Summoners are spewing out too many Nightshades for them to defend against both them and the wyverns (which are agitated because of the Nightshades). Their only hope against such odds is by having massive firepower in the form of Roe2, and an Overskill born out of desperation.