Reminder: Ballad of the Goddess is just Zelda's Lullaby Backwards

It's been several years since The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword came out. We're now in year three, I think, of Breath of the Wild being the most recent Zelda game.

I'll confess that I didn't like Skyward Sword as much as I wanted to (actually same with Breath of the Wild) but there is one element that I really find awesome:

Skyward Sword's big musical theme, its main title as it were, is the Ballad of the Goddess:

It's a stirring, heroic piece of music that really seems like a great call to adventure.

But there's a secret to it (read the title of the post if you want a spoiler): The main musical phrase of it is actually just Zelda's Lullaby reversed. No change in pace or rhythm. You can literally just reverse the song and you'll hear Zelda's Lullaby.

I still find this mind-blowing. The two melodies sound so profoundly different, despite being exact mirror images of one another.

I do not know much about music theory, so maybe someone else could explain how this works, but it feels really magical.

And it plays into the story of the game:

Spoilers ahead for an 8ish-year-old game:

Skyward Sword is the earliest-set Zelda game chronologically. While Ocarina of Time had been the "prequel game" back in the day, telling us how the dark lord Ganon became the horrible pig-demon he is, Skyward Sword goes pre-Ganon, pre-Hyrule world where the Goddess Hylia actually raised a kingdom into the sky so that it could be safe of the dangers on the surface.

We eventually discover that Zelda, Link's childhood friend, is in fact an incarnation of the Goddess - which then goes on to explain how Zelda has shown up generations later in different lives. All this time she was the Goddess Hylia!

And so the Ballad of the Goddess sharing the same notes as Zelda's Lullaby makes sense: it's the same song about the same individual.

Reckoning with Sylvanas

Sylvanas is the closest thing to a singular villain we have in Battle for Azeroth.

Now, I'm still largely convinced that N'zoth will turn out to be its true big bad - we could discover that many of the ills of the expansion are his doing or we might simply find that he's the biggest threat rather than the singular one - much as the Lich King had little to do with Yogg-Saron or Malygos.

But we have this issue:

Sylvanas is evil. Sure, she might feel she's justified in her actions and might have some kind of protective motivation for what she is doing, but at the end of the day, she has killed a massive number of people who very easily could have been left alone.

The Horde has this odd identity crisis: when interacting with anyone other than the Alliance, they are clear heroes - yes, you sometimes see them do shady stuff, but it's almost always as a way to get a leg up on the Alliance. They have no problem championing the weak and fighting to save the world, but their tactics against the Alliance and their obsessive desire to fight them turns them into aggressors and warmongers in only this one type of conflict.

But while the Horde is a largely good organization except when dealing with the Alliance, their current Warchief struggles to have any redeeming qualities.

Sylvanas doesn't have to be evil. Yes, she was raised as a banshee by Arthas and forced to serve the Scourge for a time, but when she regained her free will, she was mostly restored to the same high elf personality she had once had.

One thing I think would be interesting to consider is how much of the Forsaken psychology is inherent and how much is psychosomatic. Are they truly incapable of experiencing positive emotions, or has their state afflicted them with a powerful depression - one that is certainly not easy to cure (as it is in real life) but one that is not inextricable from their unlife.

Sylvanas uses her undead to justify a lot of horrible things.

Her worldview appears to be roughly the following:

1. The undead will never be accepted by the living. The Horde barely tolerates them as allies, and the Humans want nothing more than to destroy them.

2. The undead must perpetuate themselves in order to defend themselves - they cannot be allowed to simply die off gradually because once the Forsaken population begins to decline, the remaining few will be unable to defend themselves against a world that wishes to see them exterminated.

3. Because humanity - one of Azeroth's most populous races - seeks to have their undead kin exterminated, the only way in which to prevent them from doing so is to turn them undead, making all of humanity into Forsaken (and then possibly the rest of Azeroth.)

All three of these premises are shown to be false, but Sylvanas cannot admit that because A: her entire power structure is based on them and B: she would have to admit to the fact that she has done so many terrible things for no real purpose.

Sylvanas had plenty of blood on her hands before this expansion, but after Teldrassil it really doesn't seem there could be any justice if she doesn't meet some kind of punishment.

The obvious choice would be death - that she is overthrown in a rebellion or a successful campaign by the Alliance. But not only would that be a repeat (roughly) of the Garrosh story, it would also seem to justify her - proving that death was the only thing her enemies ever wanted for her and allowing her to die for what she believes in (even if what she believes in is a horrible lie.)

But let's consider another option:

What if Sylvanas were restored to life?

I became a big Buffy fan when I was in college (right after the show had ended, actually.) One of the main characters, who got his own spinoff after the third season, was the vampire named Angel. His story was that for about a hundred years he had been one of the most vicious and horrible vampires in the world, but after killing the wrong person, he was afflicted with a "gypsy curse," (the show's politics were in the well-meaning-but-problematic range) which - as a punishment - restored his soul to him, forcing him to feel guilt for his actions and empathy for his victims, which did put him on a road to redemption eventually but first drove him into a deep, self-loathing depression (and also ruined his relationships with his fellow murderous bloodsuckers who had become something of a family.)

So when I think of the meanest thing you could do to Sylvanas, it would be to make her alive again.

Presumably this would first mean that any emotions she had muted in undeath would come thundering back to her. Now, living people can be cruel and callous, but I suspect that the defenses she has built up around her emotions were largely based on her undead nature - she would no longer have that as an excuse to rationalize her behavior away.

But more than that, she has spent a great deal of effort trying to convince the Forsaken that you just can't trust the living, and that they are a wholly different nation and people from those who are free of the undead curse. By making her live again, she is alienated from the Forsaken, now being the very thing she has taught her people to hate.

Where does she go? Would she become a Blood Elf? Does she now have to grovel before Lor'themar Theron to be allowed back into Quel'thalas? Or does she adopt a High Elf affiliation and attempt to reconnect with her Alliance-bound sisters?

Meanwhile, is she still running the Horde?

If we assume that this process makes her horrified (or at least far more aware of her culpability) at what she has done, will she falter? Will it change how she runs things, and if so, will people turn on her?

Frankly, I think a far more interesting arc for Sylvanas is not to see her become a raid boss, but instead see her become an NPC that has gone into hiding. She could play more of an Illidan role - someone who is useful to us but also very dangerous.

Plus I think that the Forsaken would have some interesting stuff to deal with - theoretically they originally were hoping for a cure to undeath, but Sylvanas beat into them that they should be both proud of their undead status and also mistrustful of the living. But if Sylvanas is truly cured, might the Forsaken reorient themselves toward a similar treatment, or perhaps seeing what happens to Sylvanas as a result, they might evolve her undead-nationalist philosophy to be even more extreme.

Rolling for a New Campaign

This Saturday we're having a 1-shot whose primary purpose is to get one of my roommates to play D&D (she and my other roommate, her husband, were picking day one spells for her forge cleric earlier today) and I am very excited to play an Eldritch Knight fighter (I wrote a post a while ago about picking spells for him - I swapped out Shield for Disguise Self and Toll the Dead for Frostbite - the former because I figured I should take advantage of my level 3 option to pick a non Evocation/Abjuration spell and the latter because I figured I should make use of the disadvantage effect on Frostbite instead of going for pure damage with Toll the Dead - that's what my warhammer is for.)

Anyway, the plan is that the DM for our one-shot will start running a true campaign at our apartment (likely Dragon Heist/Dungeon of the Mad Mage) and naturally that puts me in the position of wanting to roll a new character.

So here are the ideas I've had:

1. More EK!

Eldritch Knight is an archetype I've wanted to play for a long time, and I might want more than one session with it. The difference, I think, would be that I'd want to play a Warforged - likely cloaking how a Warforged got to the Forgotten Realms in some fun character-background mystery.

2. Drunken Master/Shadow Monk

I think Drunken Master has a lot of potential to be a fun character personality to play - I actually think that he'd secretly be something of a teetotler, using a Tankard of Sobriety to make it look like he was getting drunk. It's mainly a question of whether I can do a Xanathar subclass with a non-PHB race. I'd want to play either an Air Genasi or maybe a Githzerai. Alternatively, I could imagine going Shadow with either a Wood Elf or Shadar-Kai. That character would probably be more serious.

3. Shadow/Divine Soul Sorcerer

The problem with the Monk is that it doesn't do spells (well, maybe a little as Shadow.) I think a Sorcerer could be pretty fun. The big question again is race options. I could maybe go Half Elf, but I think I'd prefer to go with either a good-aligned Aasimar Divine Soul sorcerer with an evil-aligned divine source or I could essentially play the enchantment-focused Half Elf Shadow sorcerer that I'd want to play in a Ravnica game (can you guess which guild?)

I think those are my primary ideas: I do like the idea of playing, say, a Wizard or a Paladin, but I might save those concepts for later.

Super Mario Odyssey

After experimenting with a return to more linear "get to the end of the level" design in Mario 3D Land for the Wii U, Mario Odyssey goes back to the established 3D Mario design of having you track down items held by bosses or hidden in puzzles.

Odyssey is a very fun game, and one that is filled with charm. Attempting to stop a wedding that Bowser has planned for himself and Peach (of course against her will - there's kidnapping involved, as always,) Mario finds himself stranded in the Hat Kingdom and befriends a hat-spirit-creature named Cappy who becomes the main mechanical conceit of the game - you can toss your hat at various creatures in order to inhabit them and use their abilities - something that recalls, of all things, the now-obscure Space Station Silicon Valley for the N64.

With a hat-shaped ship provided by the Hat Kingdom, you travel the world to various different Kingdoms that each have their own inhabitants, ranging from friendly Mexican skeleton people to tree-growing robots to realistically-proportioned humans who all wear suits and hats.

Along the way you collect Power Moons to allow your ship access to the next Kingdom. Each of these Kingdoms has a "main story" that you can play through first to get a good number of moons (often getting three-moon clusters that also look weirdly like bunches of bananas) but along these paths and after finishing these stories you'll have plenty of stuff to find.

Coins, oddly enough for a Mario game, actually function as a currency. You'll be taxed a very modest 10 coins if you die (I think you'd have to actively avoid coins to run out of them, as it's pretty easy to get into the thousands) but otherwise you can spend them in the shops in each kingdom for various costumes and stuff you can decorate your ship with.

Each Kingdom (with one or two exceptions) also has its own currency that is finite and can be used to purchase a limited number of local items including costumes, travel stickers (like the ones you'd find on an old-timey suitcase, only these go on your hat-airship) and other cosmetic rewards.

It's a great entry in the series and feels inventive and charming in a way we haven't seen since the first Mario Galaxy game.

I also want to take a moment to talk about my favorite area in the game: the Metro Kingdom. Here, in its capital of New Donk City, Mario gets to return to the place he bested Donkey Kong and rescued Pauline, who is now mayor of the city. And she is also a singer in a band! Granted, when I was a kid Mario was from Brooklyn and Donkey Kong was set in New York, but... New Donk City is a very Nintendo-ized New York City. Every car on the street is a yellow taxi that looks like it's from the mid 80s, and everyone there dresses like it's the 1940s. One would think its inhabitants, being realistically-proportioned humans speaking some strange nonsense (the exception being Pauline, who is cartoonish like Peach and who actually speaks, and most notably sings in English,) would be off-putting, but the place is actually very charming (the music, exuberant as any Mario music tends to be, helps.) There is a kind of innocent urban aesthetic the feels like something from my childhood that this seems to embody.

Anyway, this a great core-franchise Mario entry for this console generation and definitely recommended to anyone who likes the classic Nintendo offerings.

Smash Bros. Ultimate

It's funny to think that 20 years ago (holy crap I am old) the original Super Smash Bros. was a kind of low-budget, experimental game. Two years later, on a new console and with graphics that were about a million times better, the first sequel, Smash Bros. Melee, really cemented the series as an every-generation mainstay of Nintendo's brand.

Since then, we've had Brawl, the split "for Wii U" and "for 3DS" entry, and now, Smash 5 or 6 depending on how you count the previous two wisely went with the very accurate "Ultimate" as its subtitle.

The premise this time around: Everything. Every single fighter they've ever had is in this, and possibly every stage (though I feel like there's a Metroid one from the last entry I don't see.) Even the N64 ones are there (ooh! Not the Starfox one, though that would be pretty redundant with the Starfox one from Melee.)

But every fighter is back. There has been a bit of shuffling: Charizard is now once again simply one third of the options the Pokemon Trainer uses and they've made Zelda and Shiek as well as Samus and Zero Suit Samus into separate fighters (a change that came last time, I believe.)

They've included all of Wii U's DLC fighters (including Cloud, one of my favorites - who ironically made his Nintendo debut with that game) as well as adding a few more. My best friend always felt it was a huge oversight that we never got Simon Belmont in there, and well, guess what? Also, we've wanted Ridley ever since seeing the cinematic intro for Melee. Now he's there. Also, King K. Rool!

Ultimate doesn't reinvent the wheel, but it has definitely polished things to a bright sheen. The fact that there are over 70 fighters (and more coming with DLC!) means that, yes, you'll have to search through piles of Fire Emblem heroes you've never heard of when selecting your fighter (one of them is voiced by Matthew Mercer, though, so that's fun!) but the main philosophy of this entry in the series (and I think the franchise itself) is "the more the merrier," and it works quite nicely that way.

Like Brawl, Ultimate's adventure mode is ludicrous, and like 4's Smash Tour, it introduces a ton of new mechanics. But thankfully, they've streamlined unlocking fighters. You begin with only the first 8 fighters you started with in the original game (not even the four unlockable ones) and as you play, every ten minutes a new fighter will challenge you (waiting for you to finish whatever mode you're in the middle of.) The only downside is that you might feel hesitant to try out fighters you're less comfortable with in case you get a challenge after that match. If you fail one of these challenges, you'll actually be able to get rematches in the Games and More menu (there's a little symbol of a... gate, I think?) though losing a rematch will require you to play a bit more before that fighter pops up again. I think Cloud took me three tries to get.

One cool thing is that Classic Mode now has a set of fights built around a theme for each individual fighter. For example, Samus is sent after various space-based characters. Some characters will face alternate final bosses instead of Master Hand or Crazy Hand: for example, Link fights Ganon (not just Ganondorf, but fully-powered evil pig-god Ganon.)

Another feature I really like is that you can set up your Smashes (standard fights) to have "Stage Morph," where periodically the stage shifts between two selected arenas. Also, if you want a Final Destination or Battlefield-level simple stage but want more visual variety, all stages now have those modes.

And naturally, along with new fighters we have new stages and music. There's a Gerudo Valley stage with an awesome flamenco guitar version of the Gerudo Valley theme.

If you're a fan of the franchise, you'll want this version. It's got essentially everything you liked from previous games and more. And it's on the Switch, so you can take it with you!

Switching it Up!

Right! So for Xmas, and for the first time in my 32-year-old life I actually got a video game console as a gift (to be fair, the chores I did to save money for the SNES and N64 were rather generously rewarded.) I now own a Nintendo Switch.

So far I have two games for it - Smash Bros. Ultimate (obviously) which I downloaded because A: I didn't want to try to find an open store on Christmas and B: I figure that's the game I'm going to go back to the most.

The other, which I got a week or so later, is Super Mario Odyssey.

I think I'll do separate posts for them, but both have been great.

The console itself is a really clever system. Until I got back to LA I was using it basically as a mobile device, unlocking Smash Bros. 70-some-odd fighters at an embarassingly fast rate.

Sitting in its dock, the Switch simply becomes a standard console to hook up to a TV. I got a second controller for Smash Bros. purposes, this one a wired one that is almost identical to the Gamecube controller. As such, by leaving the Switch's Joy-Cons attached, it allows me to take the Switch out very easily and use it in its mobile function.

It feels a little funny that we've circled back around to cartridges, but the funniest part is that Switch cartridges are basically just SD cards - they're tiny, so I'd still recommend you keep the game cases to store them. Of course, with one downloaded title and one cartridge, I simply leave Mario Odyssey in there at all times.

My one complaint so far is that the power cord is rather short, which is tough given that we have a rather tall TV console and the only reasonable place for the Switch is on top (in front of the Wii U gamepad.)

The Joy-Cons can be configured in a number of ways - when taking the console with you, they can simple stick to the sides. Alternatively, you get a little more ergonomic grip that will hold them in more of a standard controller configuration. You can also just hold them separately, and there are sliders to put on their flat edges that include wrist straps and sort of "button extenders" to allow you to hit the buttons on the inside of those edges.

The main purpose of those buttons is to serve as shoulder buttons if you wish to use each Joy-Con as its own SNES-style controller. You can thus play multiplayer games like Smash Bros. even if you don't have any extra controllers, though the ergonomics of this configuration leave something to be desired.

Obviously any console lives on its library. So far I think one of the Switch's strengths is its ability to give existing games mobile flexibility, but I don't feel the need to buy Dark Souls again or Skyrim a third time (a couple years ago the "deluxe edition" was cheaper than buying the DLC separately.)

Given that I also got Breath of the Wild for the Wii U, I am unlikely to get one of the Switch's flagship titles (I hope no one throws rocks at me for this, but to be totally honest I wasn't crazy about BotW - I like a little more structure and also would have liked more enemy and environmental variety.

Anyway: the Switch is clearly doing many of the things they wanted for the Wii U. I hope we see some really classic games come out for it. I'll have to talk about the ones I have just after this post.

Vampires as a Playable Race in Ravnica

While I don't have any concrete plans for my Ravnica campaign (though I have a rough plot figured out) I have been very excited to run a D&D game in my favorite Magic plane.

Officially, Ravnica has eight playable races: Humans, Elves, Half Elves, Goblins, Vedalken, Loxodons, Minotaurs, and Simic Hybrids. But while those cover a lot of bases, there are a few I felt were somewhat glaring in their absence.

Merfolk and Viashino are easy enough to add: simply use Tritons and Lizardfolk respectively from Volo's Guide to Monsters. The one that I felt compelled to add, however, is Vampires.

Magic has treated Vampires as both pure scary monsters and also as one of Black's standard humanoid races (when they get tired of zombies.)

Given Ravnica's vaguely Central/Eastern European theme and the historical role they've played in the world (particularly House Dimir's Parun, the vampire Szadek) it seems fitting to let people play as vampires.

Taking the playable vampire race from Plane Shift: Ixalan as the main model, I've altered the race to allow for two sub-races and changed up the stats slightly.

As is pointed out in the Guildmaster's Guide, Ravnica vampires are different than others in that they can safely go out into the sun - not a vampire would want for shadows in an urban landscape like Ravnica. One question I have is whether to make playable vampire characters undead or allow them to be kind of "lesser vampires" who aren't fully undead yet.

The main bit of invention on my part is the Mind-Drinker's Mind Drain and Memory Thief abilities. The former is mainly just a re-skin of the Bloodthirst ability Blood-Drinkers have, but I wonder if Memory Thief is too powerful or not powerful enough.

Vampire Stats:

Ability Score Increase. Your Charisma score increases by 2.

Age. Vampires don’t mature and age in the same way that other races do.

Alignment. Vampires might not have an innate tendency toward evil, but their thirst to feed upon others often encourages vampires to abandon moral forbearance.

Size. Vampires are the same size and build as humans. Your size is Medium.

Speed. Your base walking speed is 30 feet.

Darkvision. Your nature as a creature of the night grants you superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Vampiric Resistance. You have resistance to necrotic damage.

Languages. You can speak, read, and write Common and Vampire.

Subrace: When you create a vampire character, choose a subrace, between Blood-Drinker and Mind-Drinker.

            Blood-Drinker Vampires:

By far the most common form of vampire, Blood-Drinkers can subsist on the blood of living creatures, including humanoids. Blood-Drinkers are linked together through Bloodline families.

Ability Score Increase: Your Dexterity score increases by 1.

Bloodthirst. You can drain blood and life energy from a willing creature, or one that is grappled by you, incapacitated, or restrained. Make a melee attack against the target. If you hit, you deal 1 piercing damage and 1d6 necrotic damage. The target’s hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the necrotic damage taken, and you regain hit points equal to that amount. The reduction lasts until the target finishes a long rest. The target dies if this effect reduces its hit point maximum to 0.

Feast of Blood. When you drain blood with your Bloodthirst ability, you experience a surge of vitality. Your speed increases by 10 feet, and you gain advantage on Strength and Dexterity checks and saving throws for 1 minute.

            Mind-Drinker Vampires:

Far less common than blood-drinkers, Mind-Drinker vampires are generally more solitary and secretive than their blood-drinking kin. Nearly all mind-drinkers serve as operatives of House Dimir, but some choose to ignore the guild’s dictates and either keep to themselves or in very rare instances, join other guilds (there are rumors of a few mind-drinkers working for the Azorius to aid in interrogating criminal suspects.)

Ability Score Increase: Your Wisdom score increases by 1.

Mind Drain: You can drain thoughts and life energy from a willing creature or one that is grappled by you, incapacitated, or restrained within 15 feet. You can use an action to force the target to make a DC 15 Wisdom saving throw. On a failure, the target takes 1d6 psychic damage and you become aware of the target’s surface-level thoughts. The target’s hit point maximum is reduced by an amount equal to the psychic damage taken, and you regain hit points equal to that amount. The reduction lasts until the target finishes a long rest. The target dies if this effect reduces its hit point maximum to 0.

Memory Thief: When you use your Mind Drain ability on a creature, you can attempt to force them to recall a specific piece of information or memory, allowing you to peer into more guarded thoughts. Make a Charisma check contested with a Wisdom check from them. If you succeed, that memory or thought is revealed to you.

            Once you use this feature, you cannot use it again until you finish a short or long rest.