Thea 2: Dark Hearts

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Before leaving Iceland, the team befriend the Shadow Folk who live on the edge of the island (no shortcuts here, just lots of talking over a long time) who then send one of their number, Sylvanas, to help them on their quest. As they sail back to the Slavyan isle they save the syrin Seayanna from a kraken and she too joins their crew and helps them defeat the trolls imprisoning the elder dwarf they found long ago.

Why wear clothes when you can wear shadows?

This dwarf is then taken to the patient researcher who is then able to decypher the tablet in the Red Ridge mine which gives the location of the quake causing threat, but also says to fix it they would need a magical heart assembled by a druid. With no leads on any druids, the team sails to the next island - the isle of darkness, home to striga, undead, vampires and... more followers of the light!?

Sylvanas is handy in convincing the darker beasties to simply let everyone pass while Seayanna uses her charm to convince female bandit captain Yanka to join the team, who then reveals that the Spirit Talker goblin tribe also resides here. Thanks to the goblin children in the party and a little assistance helping them build a catapult, they introduce the group to their leader: an orc necromancer who can construct the magical heart they need to save the world. Not only that, the necromancer and the entire tribe are coming to help too. Things are looking up!

Thea 2: Strength

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Iceland is also home to followers of the light: people, creatures, and tentacles(wtf?) infused by a viral spirit and this faction constantly harasses the team with their "convert or die" methodology to the point that Siegfried tracks down their local base and leads an attack that wipes it out, at the cost of Jaethal who was light tentacled to death. Her daughter, Karina the crazy, also dies giving birth to a son Krisztian - whose father is her half brother Vshesul. The boy really has a thing for incest. Ratslava also gives birth to a daughter Mishka, having slept with King Szuvarek of the Water Demon clan after his rescue.

Anyway, after killing little red riding hood (who in this version is a werewolf), the team find the Ice Demon village and Nyrissa befriends them via an exchange student program: giving them Krisztian to raise as their own while they gain Ice Demon daughter Sniezynki and her pet elemental Icicles.

The Little Red Lie on steam is free to play if you like Little Red Riding Hood.

The team then run into the slaver band that held Romek captive and this time the slavers are killed - with the team gaining a young girl named Anzeka and three young goblins: Jere, Tino and Zosh. As they are overburdened with supplies at this stage, the team trade with the Ice Demons to buy powerful magical weapons and God's Armour? Siegfried decides to test these out at a local arena where the group must face five battles of increasing difficulty in a row and they are victorious! This band of champions are now ready to take on the world.

Thea 2: Iceland

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Since the only elder dwarf on the Slavyan isle is guarded by powerful trolls, the group decides to make a ship and sail to the next island over to continue the search. Ice island, dubbed by Siegfried as "Iceland", is quite inhospitable with the lack of food resources and the constant requirement for faith replenishing rituals. They also save the cursed child Zloslawa from her murderous parents and she too begins learning the way of the witch.

This place is full of witches.

Iceland is also home to the Water Demon clan (russalkas) who are at war with the Water Pirates (orcs). Nyrissa quickly befriend the Water Demons by saving their leader, King Szuvarek, from a Water Pirate base on the lake. Only two of the Water Pirate youths are spared to join the group: Little Pirate and his younger sister Deathlover who is again, witch potential. Valerie quickly gains their trust by having a daughter with Little Pirate they call Zenzimira. Nyrissa then promptly baptizes the girl at the Water Demon lake to turn the child into a Water Demon, deepening the friendship with that group so much that a russalka named Natalia also joins their ranks.

Meanwhile Siegfried encountered the cursed King Kral'Skra, doomed to be forever trapped in his crumbling kingdom by the gods who also stole his face and put it on a lowly demon. Siegfried agrees to find and slay this fiend only to discover it is Kral'Skra's son Romek whose back was infused with his fathers face and is now being towed around by some slavers. After purchasing the child Siegfried makes him face his father and Kral'Skra opts that he instead be killed instead of his son. Siegfried obliges, and Romek joins the group as a zerca.

Thea 2: Red Ridge

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The Red Ridge bandits are an imposing lot, but they agree to let Siegfried's team and the researcher into their territory if the adventurers can first remove from their lands a cave full of demons and a camp full of squatters, who are possibly one and the same. Both are equally easy to massacre, and the child Barbara is taken into the group from the squatter camp as she has the traits of a zerca (a spiritual leader).

Finally granted access, the researcher finds an old tablet in the Red Ridge mines but is unable to read them - now requiring an elder dwarf or elf for the task. Siegfried promises to help and Red Ridge bandit Captain Bear joins them. Also Miloslava has another daughter, Sveibora, this time with her son Vshesul (that motherf*cker) while Valerie helps wandering King "Arathor" to pull a sword from a stone. The thankful King sends Valerie across a bridge (which holds a battle of wisdom) to a nearby lake where the local lady of the lake hands her a less powerful but still magical weapon.

Only movie knowledge can save your characters from certain death...

Meanwhile Nyrissa aids Suri, a little girl found on the road, to get revenge on the rich silk trading merchants that killed her family. Suri turns out to be a spider queen in disguise but Nyrissa keeps her word and slays the merchants which is enough to convince Suri to join the team (and wow, spider queens are strong). Suri then promptly begins teaching Sveibora the ways of witch craft, because spider queens know everything apparently.

Thea 2: Retinue

[Part of the Cursed story line]

After a long and prolific reign, Siegfried Baranor gave up his crown to travel to new rumbling lands with his nymph queen Nyrissa, lover Jaethal, muse Valerie, obese fan girls Miloslava and Ratslava (sisters), and Siegfried's children Karel the fighter (with Nyrissa), Karina the crazy (with Jaethal) and Vshesul the warrior (with Miloslava) after a friendly imp suggested their old enemy, the Lantern King, was hatching a new plot here.

Quarreling with the local scavenger Slavyans wasn't helping matters any so the group instead opted for friendship - clearing some vermin, convincing goblins to move away, and doing odd jobs to gain their friendship while living off the land, harvesting resources as they went, and dodging the multitudes of unliving that clustered around old ruins. 

Including striga.

Miloslava also saves a vodnik prince turned into a frog by kissing him... a lot apparently, as she soon has a daughter Lethiamira. Nyrissa also befriends the local spider folk (who are simply intelligent giant spiders) while Valerie retrieves two half russalka daughters for their dwarf father. Doing all this leads them to a researcher investigating the rumbling (Eren is that you?) but his work has stopped since the location he needs to study is occupied by the territorial Red Ridge bandits.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Fairy Tale

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Aldori troops led by Lady Jamandi supported by Kesten's guardsmen and Jhod's faith push through the wild hunt forces giving an opening for Siegfried, Jaethal, Valerie, Bouquet, Arkemyr and Garret to reach the Lantern King (multi phased boss fight). Fortunately Nyrissa is here too and has enough strength to break her bonds and assist the heroes to defeat the annoying fireball who is banished like the weakling he is. Only the unimportant nameless extras and Jhod die in this final phase which is a resounding victory for the King.

Keeping his promise, Siegfried takes Nyrissa as his queen but also has a friends with benefits status with a young hot elf that looks like a younger version of her mother Jaethal. In fact Jaethal now wears her daughter as a living skin suit thanks to the ritual she learned earlier - making her both not-quite undead and also more evil than when she started. With a strong alliance to house Aldori, the untouchable ace Valerie remains as regent and lawman Kesten marries ex-bandit Bouquet while Archmage Arkemyr and thief Garrett return to their own lands wealthier than before.

Then Siegfried got more advisors through the cash shop?

That's it for Pathfinder: Kingmaker. Pretty cool game but also very long. The later periods of kingdom management are pretty tough with those super high difficulty checks, but not as tough/unfair as the later combats. Especially against swarms. I hate those things.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Faeking Hell

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Nyrissa's foothold is well guarded as Gerrod is slain in a redcap ambush and Voghiln eaten by a purple worm simply to reach it (there's also a BS battle against a ghost army that needed a lot of loading), and once through Siegfried and company found themselves at Nyrissa's large mansion in the fairy realm, except for Linzi who ironically dies for real during the jump. Luckily pathfinders Crimson Fury the barbarianess, Ellert the ranger, Scatvi the cleric, Lash the Bard and the archmage Arkemyr (annoyed at Nyrissa's meddling) arrive as reinforcements for this raid.

In the course of the exploration Fassina and Nigga B are slain by forces of the wild hunt while Crimson Fury is fatally broken by an autumn golem before Nyrissa herself is located in the heart of the structure. The nymph summons hordes of creatures to her side which kill Ellert, Scatvi and Kaessi (and that's after I lowered the difficulty and spammed greater shout with Lash to stun her) before she surrenders in defeat - tearfully explaining that some elder fae god is making her do all this horrible stuff.

The goose made me do it!

Since Siegfried finds her attractive, he offers the nymph an alliance but said elder god "The Lantern King" who looks like a giant fireball suddenly arrives and decides he's not finished playing with his toys. He takes Nyrissa captive and opens a gate to Siegfried's kingdom - warping it horribly by bringing it to the fairy realm while resurrecting the shades of Siegfried's greatest foes (to extend the game because 80 hrs is not long enough?) and cursing the king with weakness.

And so Siegfried's forces gate hop to re-defeat the Stag Lord, the troll queen and kobold king. Lash is "finger-of-deathed" by the shade of Vordakai at Varnhold where Siegfried reunites with old ally Rollo who helps defeat the shadow lich cyclops(?). The reunion is short lived as Rollo is then killed by the true shade of King Irovetti at Pitax Palace whom Arkemyr destroys. This lifts the curse on King Siegfried who now focuses all his attention on assaulting the capital where the Lantern King now rules. Luckily Lady Jamandi Aldori is a woman of her word and arrives with troops to assist.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Tournament of Kings

[Part of the Cursed story line]

After defeating yet another one of Nyrissa's worthless invasion attempts the newly crowned King Siegfried Baranor accepts an invitation to partake in the Rushlight tournament of the neighboring kingdom of Pitax where Bouquet wins a fishing and diving contest, Voghiln wins the knot contest, Linzi wins the boasting contest and Siegfried wins the drunken brawl event which makes the host, King Irovetti look even more of a fool than usual so he begins harassing the border villages using wild animals and bandits in an undeclared war which is as ineffective as he himself is.

King Baranor's is swift, sending forces into Pitax to annihilate both the animal teleporters and the bandits losing only Iholikan Quinval to the color spray of a golden golem which explodes his face? King Irovetti then has the gall to summon Siegfried to come and surrender in person, so without much fuss he goes there with his entire council and easily turns most of the citizens against Irovetti gaining allies in Kaessi the tielfling mage and tavern bouncer Nigga B. Irovetti's guards are easily overpowered in the square but the annoying King retreats and barricades himself in his palace behind his elite troops and it is up to Siegfried's forces to root him out.

At this point it's worth mentioning every fight needs pre-buffing with legendary proportions and stone skin but even so Shelumu is killed by an arrow to the face at the foyer, Linzi "dies (again)" to an armored troll, Amiri and Ubin are cut down by elite guards in the barricaded main hall and Jubilost has his neck broken by Irovetti's naga before Fassina can kill it. Siegfried kills Irovetti himself and adds Pitax to his ever expanding kingdom.

Yep, spells that makes you bigger, harder and stronger.
You need magical Viagra to survive later fights!

Somehow this victory reduces the kingdom's state to CRUMBLING which is the lowest you can let it go before losing the game. Over the next few months King Baranor makes wise decisions and builds infrastructure to get it back through rioting, troubled, worried and finally to stable (never got it to "serene" though). During this time Nyrissa established a permanent foothold gate far in the Western forests, giving the King an opening to finally strike back at this elusive foe.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Traitor

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Upon returning from Varnhold, Lander reports two time sensitive matters: sightings of Tristian the traitor and a war between the Tiger Lords barbarians and the forces of Jamandi Aldori. Siegfried rallies the troops and commands them to support House Aldori first. Since Ekun decides to ignore this command and have a pity party for himself instead, the baron publicly executes him as a deserter which gets the rest of the soldiers in line.

When being lawful good is just like being chaotic evil.

Upon arriving at the battlefield the baron then learns Amiri has gone solo to try assassinate the Tiger Lord King Armag. Two days ago. Since the battle still looks like its going to happen it's safe to say she failed (as per usual), but this doesn't bother Siegfried who has recruited a new set of allies trying to rebuild their own lands: Gerrod, Garrett, Iholikan Quinval, Ubin, Fassina and Voghiln. Just as well because Lander shows up with assassins to try kill the baron but only ends up "killing" Linzi again before being eliminated himself.

Pity the delay has let King Armag escape, but this act of cowardice breaks the remaining Tiger Lords who disband their tribe. Also broken is a tortured and abused Amiri, whose spirit is as shattered as her once giant sword. While scouts hunt down the missing Armag, Siegfried takes his team to apprehend Tristian next who is hiding in the fairy realm.

When cornered the cleric admits to being an unwilling servant of a nymph named Nyrissa, who for some reason is out to destroy Siegfried's barony. Siegfried is all but ready to pardon him until he admits to being the one who planted the seed flower which resulted in the deaths of thousands. Upon hearing that, the baron gets Jaethal to execute Tristian on the spot.

Meanwhile, Valerie is put on trial by her old pervert paladin order but proves them all wrong when her goddess heals her scars and helps her smite them all down. Since her face is now fixed, Siegfried reappoints her as regent. Months later, the now mad Armag is found just over the hill from the battlefield and is put down by the baron's forces and tiger lord deserters.

With this done Lady Jamandi Aldori proclaims Siegfried as King of his expanding lands, and offers an alliance he graciously accepts.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Eye Spy Vordakai

[Part of the Cursed story line]

While the citizens of Varnhold are indeed missing, the land seems rife with barbarians of the Tiger Lords Tribe (an interesting name since they have around zero tigers) who are searching for some relic and are actually running into problems with all the undead cyclopses inhabiting the ancient structures here. Since they are generally ok people, the baron assists each of their expeditions and gets survivors to return to their main expedition camp.

This backfires somewhat after all the scouts are saved as a talking crow convinces the barbarian expedition leader to attack the baron and his allies, resulting in a difficult fight which ends up seeing every single Tiger Lord barbarian lying dead in the dirt afterwards. The crow then "invites" the survivors to the distant tomb of its master Vordakai, a clear trap but one they must walk into since he has answers about the missing Varnholdians.

As expected, the tomb is filled with zombies, traps, pressure plate mazes where you must split the party, and incredibly the poor design of hiding buttons and other important clickables in NON VIEWABLE LOCATIONS. Did the devs forget this game has a fixed camera? Also present are soul eaters who, if they know your name, can only be targeted by that character. Siegfried, Ekun and Linzi all end up dueling one with only Linzi getting "killed", but not really because she has a magic ring of cheese.

You need to mouse over the black area to see that! WTF!?

Vordakai himself is a cyclops lich and before he can use his own artifact of BS which traps people in jars for later consumption, Tristian gets it, revealing himself to be a traitor. Since it's clear he is doing this under duress, Siegfried convinces him to destroy the artifact. Unfortunately the baron can't talk Tristian into surrendering though and the cleric escapes via magic portal. After Ekun finishes the lich off, the soul pots are discovered in his treasury nearby and breaking them releases and revives all the missing Varnholdians! Hurray!

Extra hurray as Jaethal discovers one of these to be the person that actually murdered her. She agrees to spare this person in exchange for a super duper ritual that can improve her more and the idiot gives it to her. With it committed to memory she then kills her murderer with her scythe, and Siegfried just laughs.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Cursed Contagion

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The arrival of crazed beasts from portals at a cursed hill has citizens worried so new regent Lander invites delegations for a hunt! This all goes well until one of the attendants suddenly explodes into an owl bear? Upon investigation Jhod and Tristian discover this is due to portal seeds being ingested from the river and Kesten leads the investigation to a cult comprised mainly of stupid goblins intentionally spreading the contagion (because absolutely no one boils water before drinking it in fantasy realms).

Stupid contagion spreading goblins come in many forms.

His inside man goblin Nok-Nok reveals that the seeds come from high in the mountains (not the cursed hill) and are travelling down the river to the capital! They quickly rush to its defense as many citizens explode into horrible creatures that need slaying. One particularly large owlbear crushes Nok-Nok underfoot before order is restored.

While this happens Baron Siegfried leads his team to the source discovering it to be two giant plants, one blooming in a cave and the other blooming the world of fairies. To defeat it they must torch both at the same time so Siegfried, Octavia and Bouquet fight the fairy version while Valerie, Ekun and his wolf take the cave version. Alas Octavia is eaten by the fairy version of the plant but there is no time to save her as the cave team set their version on fire. The baron does the same and burns the horrible flora (and Octavia) to ash. He will never forget her screams.

With the threat ended there is some time to regroup and rebuild, until lady Jamandi Aldori tasks the baron with finding out what has happened to the neighboring land of Varnhold... whose citizens all seem to have gone missing.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Trolling the Baron

[Part of the Cursed story line]

The troll threat is interesting in two ways: firstly they are allied with kobolds and secondly unlike regular trolls these ones seem to be fire resistant! An arrogant gnome alchemist Jubilost who is saved from one of their raiding parties suggests this ability comes from some sort of magical brand which is probably of dwarven make so the team immediately hunts down any dwarven ruins in the area and sure enough find their stronghold "kingdom" in the Southern end of the forest. Troll hating foreign ranger Ekun is also met here and joins the team for the purge. Like most fantasy games rangers get stronger through racism!

It takes awhile before the king kobold and troll queen are discovered at the branding forge (because of bad camera angles, if you get stuck here go to the largest room to the North West in the downstairs section and follow the wall left) and the pair prove to be a difficult fight with Regongar being pulverized by the troll queen's club before Seigfried can defeat it and Octavia counter spells the king kobold. The few remaining kobolds and trolls scatter back to the forest, ending this threat and on the way back to the capital (which was previously the Stag Lord's fortress) the team save a lizardman village from a possessed kid and help an alien spider return home.

I wonder if it can tell the time?

Bad news awaits upon arrival though - Jaethal went and killed some elves she thought murdered her previously, Tristian is spotted colluding with anti-Seigfried cultists, Valerie got into a duel with one of her exes and lost, suffering a terrible scar on her face, and Linzi was caught pilfering the treasury to try fund her dream printing press. Since she now has the face of a loser, Valerie is stripped from her regent position which goes to Lander and Linzi is giving a stern talking to (because there was no option to execute her - weak designers) with Siegfried promising that due to her actions there will NEVER be ANY printing press ANYWHERE ON HIS LAND. FOREVER.

No action is taken against Tristian who has earned the benefit of the doubt through excellent work ethic and Jaethal whom Siegfried is crushing hard on. On the plus side Jubilost's keen intellect makes him an excellent treasurer, easily replacing Shelumu from that position.

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Lord of the Stolen Lands

[Part of the Cursed story line]

It soon becomes clear that bandits aren't the only problem in the stolen lands as Siegfried's team also defeats foreign slavers and mad fauna, saving (and recruiting) the enslaved couple Octavia (a better trap disarmer than Linzi) and Regongar from the first and cleric pair Jhod Kavken and Tristian from the second. Using diplomacy, Siegfried also gets a small group of the Stag Lord's own disgruntled people to turn on him. Not only do they reveal the location of his fort, they actively assist in getting the entire team within the walls. Apparently no one's challenged the Stag Lord in so long that his security has become very lax!

Look out, the drunk is going to shoot his sword at us!

Unable to talk him into surrendering, a big fight breaks out which results in Harrim being mauled to death by the Stag Lord's per owlbear and Siegfried slaying the Stag Lord. All the enemy bandits are killed as are all but one of the friendly bandits. Siegfried recruits the sole  survivor, a halfling ranger named Bouquet.

With the task complete the team returns for a celebratory feast at Jamandi Aldori's mansion where she keeps her word and installs Siegfried as the new baron of the Stolen Lands. She also tries convince him to take her adopted son as his emissary but Siegfried picks young Lander  instead, who seems the only independent choice available.

And so comes the arduous task of actually governing the realm with advisors Jhod as high priest, Tristian as councilor, Valerie as regent, Shelumu as treasurer, and Amiri as general. While Siegfried non-user friendly town construction interface, Jhod goes off to rebuild a temple, Valerie deals with a vanity cult, Shelumu starts losing the realms money and while Tristian is amazing at any task set before him, General Amiri is a widespread failure. She fails to catch left over bandits (twice), fails to train guards, and fails to build a simple wall. Sheesh.

Siegfried almost jumps for joy at the news of an amassing troll army in the woods since it means he can take a break from doing all that boring stuff!

Pathfinder Kingmaker - Aldori's Heroes

[Part of the Cursed story line]

Answering the call for "heroes", Siegfried Baranor finds himself attending a meeting at Jamandi Aldori's mansion who asks that the assembled group reclaim a section on the map called "the Stolen Lands" from the problematic bandits within and in addition to any loot, the victor would also be granted ruling rights over said land (which I'm not sure is a good thing but anyway). To improve odds (and to separate people via alignments) she splits the heroes into two groups with Siegfried being assigned with the happy halfling songstress Linzi (who doubles as a trap disarmer), the bloodthirsty barbarianess Amiri, and the gorgeous guardslady Valerie.

Meanwhile on the "evil" team...

Their entry point to the zone would be a small trading post where Siegfried recruits Sonya, another barbarianess, and his old boss the wizard Shelumu who was now on the run from a foreign power he challenged. Lawman Kesten Garess stops by shortly after and indicates Aldori's second squad of "heroes" (of the evil alignment variety) isn't hunting the bandits at all but going on some sort of treasure hunt making things worse in the region so the team decide to go after them first, finding them in an underground kobold burrow where they quickly come to blows.

Their gnome wizard manages to incinerate Sonya to a crisp before Amiri beheads him. His surviving allies Harrim the constantly depressed cleric and Jaethal the amnesiac undead elf are quick to surrender and join the winning side upon seeing this, but report they had already found whatever relic their leader was looking for, and the gnome threw it into a magic portal before Siegfried's team arrived.

Figuring that relic would be of little consequence anyway, the team returns to the trading post to rest up and resupply before starting their actual job here: rooting out the bandits led by the self titled Stag Lord.