Things Maelstrom Arena has taught me

covenant_merchant

• Maelstrom, n : a dangerous area of water that moves very fast in a circle is in no way, shape, or form related to the actual contents of the Arena.
• The RNJesus is one cruel, sick, and twisted god, who is way too much into schadenfreude.
• The chances to pull a Charged or Powered weapon are proportional to the hopes and desperation you have for a good trait.
• After doing Vault of Umbrage enough times, you will end up with a compulsive hate of Argonians and all things lizard-related.
• Said Argonians seem to sense whenever you go on a Flawless run, and will spawn on top of toxic exploding mushrooms, making your life difficult.
• In my backstory, the Argonian Behemoth boss is Xal-Nur's lost and less sentient half-brother. See Hagrid and Grawp in the Harry Potter franchise for a literary parallel.
• Stormproof, just like Former Emperor, is another way of saying "once, it used to be great".
• "You're not done with this Arena yet" will haunt your nightmares.
• "This can't last much longer" is funny when taken out of context.
• Someone, somewhere, actually did the Maelstrom Arena only for the quest and roleplaying value.
• The Control Guardian boss in Seht's Balcony is a kids-friendly version of the Engine Guardian in Darkshade Caverns.
• Theater of Despair, Rink of Frozen Blood, Vale of the Surreal with its dance around the Tree of Death... The devs like their prose purple, thank you very much.
• Igneous Cistern is a more flowery way of saying Fiery Pit. But nobody would take "Survive the Fiery Pit" seriously.
• Seht's Balcony, Seht's Flywheel... Who is Seht ?
• Answering in the guild chat while in Seth's Balcony is never a good idea. The spinning blades can actually hurt.
• Voriak Solkyn is an anagram of Valkyn Skoria, making it either a product of lazy writing or a clever hint at their relationship.
• If the Dragonstar Arena is Boethia's playground, whose b*tch is Fa-Nuit-Hen?
• _You help the demiprince with his memory? how?
  _I act as a sort of peripheral memory storage for him when he goes … dreaming. This line of dialogue from Fa-Nuit-Hen's tutor basically makes him a humanoid medieval-fantasy equivalent of an SD card.
• Aki, one of the Giants' name from the Rink of Frozen Blood, means Autumn in Japanese. Which is kind of a weird name for an angry giant, but whatever.
• Baron Who Moves Like This, Multiplier of Movements Known, Multiplier of Motions Known, Daedric Conflict Resolution Coach... These were named by a five year-old.
• The Arena's lobby has beds upstairs. And a lot of alcohol in nightstands and cupboards. One can only wonder why.
• Someone took the time of sculpting busts of every single boss of every single stage. These statues adorn the Arena's lobby.
• No matter how proud you are of completing the Arena, some will belittle you for "not bursting the 3 centurions in Seht's Balcony before they go into shield mode", "not bursting the Giant Matriarch in the Rink of Frozen Blood after the first platform", "not bursting Maxus the Many in the Vale of the Surreal before the adds spawn", etc.
• We could be interplanar mercenaries! Fa-Nuit-Hen's goal is to be a crossover of Captain Malcolm Reynolds from Firefly and John Silver from Treasure Planet.
• Valkyn Tephra, the boss from the Igneous Cistern, is named after pyroclasts, which are basically flying rocks ejected by an erupting volcano. Which is actually quite apt and clever. And also requires a Google search unless you're a geologist. Or an aspiring geologist. Or a guy with a rock-fetish. Guess which one am I.
• The fuels for the fires at the entrance of the Arena are human flesh and bones. Just fyi.
• From a roleplaying perpective, the fact that the Arena resets and you're forced into the same mindless grind over and over again, might be due to the fact that it's all a dream Fa-Nuit-Hen is having. After all, His mind wanders far afield at times, and when it returns, his memory is often rather confused.
  Also it makes for a far more poetic reason than "omg that freaking sharpened inferno staff still hasn't dropped after 200 runs".

Tryxus

Me thinks you need a bit of a break from vMSA: your mind is going so random from the RNG that everything starts to make sense

ZOS_PeterT

We have moved this thread to Dungeons, Trials & Arenas

Doctordarkspawn

This is why you shouldn't do Maelstrom, Kids.

Just say no to Maelstrom.

Izaki

Alcohol helps. Sometimes...

Rune_Relic

IzakiBrotheSs wrote: »

Alcohol helps. Sometimes...

But doe sit help you cope with the content or complete the content ?

Do you lol when you epically fail.....or start plucking keys from the keyboard...with a twitch on one eye ..rocking back and forth....with a whispered 'mummy help' mantra..just before total system overload and shutdown protection kicks in ?

covenant_merchant

IzakiBrotheSs wrote: »

Alcohol helps. Sometimes...

Ahaha, yeah, just like my "Things Being Emp Taught me", this was inspired by @Preyfar . Though for vMSA, due to the rage potential, I'd rather not add drinks on top of that.