#invitation to wine

[cor-lapis]

Ancient Yanese legend has it that Lava waited in that reception room almost as long as she spent trapped in Dusk's painting

#so hi you know when i said im into arknights now. i'm into arknights now #arknights #my art #yeah. the event grabbed my brain. #i don't want to talk about how many tries that boss took me o<-< #anyway i hope that enough people into genshin are also into arknights for this to not drive 100% of people away fhsbjcbsb. #not genshin #<- tag to blacklist in case you only want to see my genshin stuff u_u #invitation to wine #<- i got the event title wrong earlier WHOOPS

[bobbile-blog]

Arknights Lore Recap: End of 2023

Here I was, thinking my last post would be sufficient, but they keep on adding more gosh darn lore. Half a year has gone by since my last post, so I thought I'd update things and make another post of "where is everyone at the moment" to help keep all these plotlines straight. So, here's the sequel! More events, more organization since it's no longer a half-assed post I wrote on my phone in an hour, and you'd better believe we've got more lore to get through.

(Of course, spoilers for the current state of basically everything in Global, though they'll be the kind of "current events" spoilers to help you understand where we are at the moment)

Currently Active Plotlines:

Main Story act II: Main story chapters/ What the Firelight Casts, Amiya/ Siege/ Stainless/ Shining/ W/ Kal'tsit/ Doctor/ Closure/ etc.

Act 2 is in full swing, and oh boy do we have some politics to wade through. The general idea, minimizing spoilers, is that the Royal Court of the Sarkaz have taken over Londinum and intend to expand further using the catastrophe-creating superweapon The Shard. They're led by Theresis and the (mostly) united Sarkaz lords, and with a mercenary army they basically rule Victoria as an occupying power. Their power is concentrated in Londinum, the only city they really formally occupy, but as they control the seat of the country's power they effectively have the rest of the country at their mercy.

Opposing them are a number of factions. Firstly, the coalition of Victorian Nobles that have ruled the country (and that technically invited the Sarkaz to Victoria in the first place) want the throne again. There are a few specific nobles we deal with in ch12 but the implication is the politics will be elaborated on in the next chapter so we'll leave it there, the point is that they're the Victorian establishment trying to go back to old Victoria which means they suck. They're also working with Dublinn, who are collaborating with the Duke of Wellington(?) who is sympathetic to their causes. The Nobles have just recently gone to formal war with the Sarkaz, but they also all hate each other and will absolutely stab each other in the back whenever possible.

Besides them, there are also a couple of smaller underground resistance factions. The Londinum Self-salvation Corps, or Eartha, is a guarilla resistance movement who is currently getting their asses handed to them by the Sarkaz. They basically existed solely because the Sarkaz hadn't bothered to wipe them out yet, and have currently evacuated all of their surviving personnel out of the city. Additionally, there's a group of Victorian soldiers led by Commander Skamandros who have been sticking their noses into things. If I recall correctly, they're trying to evacuate Londinum as well.

Finally, we have Rhodes Island. We're here because of the classic D&D reason of "well all our plotlines seem to end up in this general area so I guess that's where we're going". Amiya and Kal'tsit feel somewhat responsible for not stopping Theresis and Amiya specifically is probably the only person with the right to challenge Theresis for the throne of the Sarkaz. Bagpipe and Reed (and Ch'en) are dealing with Dublinn things, so they have to be around here. Shining is a Confessarius and her evil wizard family is supporting Theresis so she's got stuff to do there. Siege is the last surviving member of the Victorian Royal family, so she's bound by blood and obligation to reclaim the throne, as well as just generally wanting to help the people of Victoria. Hoderer is currently in the employ of the Sarkaz and Innes is working in Londinum as a spy for Rhodes Island, so W wants to head there too. There's a lot going on, far too much to describe, so I'll leave things at "we have half a dozen personal plotlines to pursue there" so I can move on to the actual side events.

The Devil's Dragonball Fusion Dance: Ancient Forge(?)/ Who is Real/ Invitation to Wine/ Where Vernal Winds will Never Blow, Nian/ Dusk/ Ling/ Chong Yue/ Lava/ Kroos/ Lee/ Waai Fu/ Lin/ Zuo Le/Liang Xun

This one is updated pretty regularly as the CN new year event. The short lore overview is that Yan used to be populated by godlike beings called Feranmuts. Feranmuts fought a war with people, which concluded when a Feranmut named Sui betrayed his people because they wanted to be the only one with their kind of powers. After the war, the emperor of Yan (China analogue) split him into 12 fragments which eventually developed their own identities and personalities - these are the Sui siblings, i.e. Nian, Dusk, Ling, Chong Yue, etc. Once all twelve of these siblings meet again, they will reform back into Sui and they'll probably take over the world or whatever. We don't know exactly but it won't be good.

There are currently three parties interested in gathering the siblings, and one trying to prevent them. Firstly, the Second Brother (who is currently unnamed) is just a little crazy, and is currently working with the Yanese ministry of rites to revive Sui. We don't know a ton about him, but we know he's somehow split himself into fragments and scattered himself across the land. Secondly, Ya is another Feranmut that survived the old war and wants revenge on Yan and Sui. They want Sui revived so they can have a proper form of revenge on Them, and are currently in control of the Shanhaizhong bandits kinda just causing issues wherever They can. Finally, Nian and her siblings at Rhodes Island also want to gather the siblings, but not to re-form Sui. She has some sort of plan to bring the siblings together without losing themselves, and is working with Rhodes Island to accomplish it. Similarly, we don't know a lot about her plan, but they're generally the protagonists of the events. Finally, Zuo Le is an official in a Yanese organization called the Sui Regulator, whose job is to monitor and secure the remaining Feranmuts and the fragments of Sui. Zuo Le is doing his best, but he's a little out of his weight class, so most of what he does is follow the Sui fragments around and try to figure out what the hell is going on.

The Call of We Many: Grani and the Knight’s Treasure/ Under Tides/ Stultifera Navis/ Mizuki and Caerula Arbor (Integrated Strategies 3), Skadi/ Specter/ Gladiia/ Kal’tsit.

Was updated pretty frequently as an anniversary event, but they seem to have thrown us a big lore dump with Caerula Arbor and left it at that for the time being, which is understandable. The lore here is the Seaborn are a race decended from some early Feranmuts who are basically a constantly-evolving devouring swarm. They exist to consume and assimilate all of the life on the planet, and unless we are very very careful and work very very quickly they are going to do just that.

The state of the plot at the moment is a little odd. Because Mizuki and Caerula Arbor isn't canon, the plot is still at the end of Stultifera Navis. Specter has recovered her self, and the team of Abyssal hunters is delving deeper into the current state of the seaborn. Their former leader, Ulpanius, has shown up to warn them not to return to Aegir, and while the Stultifera Navis sank the lighthouse was recovered and some trinkets from the ship made it back. We aren't really sure where we're going from here, but it's not necessarily to Caerula Arbor. Basically, the canon lore of IS3 is that on a mission to the Iberian Coastline, the Doctor and Mizuki found a weird seaborn monument, and Mizuki used their connection to the Seaborn's minds to look into alternate timelines and show them to the Doctor. That means that while the events of the story are not canon, the Doctor may still know and reference the events in the story. I'm not going to go over all of IS3 because there's so much of it but you can find a rough summary here.

Fangs of the Signiori dei Lupi: Hinted earlier in the main story/ Il Siracusano, Texas/ Emperor/ Lapland/ Projekt Red/ Lunacub.

This is the newest of these plots, set up in Il Siracusano and presumably proceeding from there. The Feraerus are supernatural talking animals that we’ve encountered a couple of times throughout the story, like the High Priest or the Emperor. They are connected with the land and are almost akin to guardians of it. They don’t need Originium for their magic, and are tied to the setting in ways we don’t quite understand yet. More importantly to us, though, they’re involved in their own power struggles and contests among each other. This underscored the drama in Il Siracusano - the whole Bellone family was propped up by the wolf Feraerus Zarro as part of an ancient game in which the wolves pick champions, called Fangs, who fight each other in a Battle Royale to decide the pack’s next alpha a la the fake wolf study. We know a couple of the fangs - Lunacub is one and Bernardo was another before his death, but Projekt Red is also a Fang, as well as Crownslayer’s mentor, so we’ll probably be coming back to this conflict in the future. It's unclear how we'll approach it, though, as Bernardo and Lunacub's files seem to imply that the eventual goal will breaking free of this game.

Law and Otherwise: Guide Ahead, Fiametta/ Mostima/ Andoain/ Cecile/ Lemuen/ Pope Yvangelista XI/ Law/ Executor/ Enforcer

This one hasn't been super developed yet, but it's worth including with both Hortus de Escapismo and Zwillingstürme im Herbst coming up. Laterano, the city of the Sankta, is governed by immutable laws that are engraved onto the very bodies of the Sankta. In Guide Ahead, Andoain seeks to ask the Pope the question of why the Sankta do not help the people of the world. He learns that the laws that bind the Sankta are real, physical commandments enforced by Law, a robotic entity similar to the Preserver from Lonetrail, and the consequences and exceptions relating to the law are entirely at its discretion. The law is what it is because Law says so.

The Sami Icefields

This hasn’t technically gotten an event yet, besides that one story in Operational Intelligence, but I’m including it as an honorable mention because we’re going there for IS4. The Icefields are up north of Ursus, and they are terrifying. You remember the Emperor’s Blade, the one that kicks your ass in WD-8? Yeah we only see three of them in the game because the rest are busy fighting against the Eldritch demons constantly invading from the Sami Icefields. Let’s please never go there ever, thanks.

Finished Plotlines:

These two are complete plots, which I'm including for posterity and the worldstate. Spoilers for all of these events, but I'll try to keep things to the present so as to not spoil too much.

The Grand Knight Major: Maria Nearl/ Pinus Sylvestris/ Near Light/ Obscure Wanderer, Blemishine/ Zofia/ Nearl/ The Followers/ Flametail/ Ashlock/ Fartooth/ Wildmane/ Justice Knight my beloved/ Gravel/ Platinum/ Roy/ Monique/ Młynar.

Margaret Nearl won the 24th Major and became the Grand Knight, and has since stayed in Kazimierz to improve living conditions for the infected and push back against the General Chamber of Commerce. The Armorless Union has mostly been decapitated - the Platinum defected, the Lazurites have disappeared and taken on new identities, and the Darksteel has promised to stay away from Margaret and Rhodes Island. Pinus Sylvestris and most of the rest of the Nearls are now on the landship, working for Rhodes Island.

A New Age is Upon Us: Mansfield Break/ Dorothy’s Vision/ Lonetrail/ the second Records of Originium comic (which has an official translation that you should absolutely read it’s really good)/ the Friston-3 event whenever Yostar decides to get around to releasing it, Silence/ Ptilopsis/ Saria/ Ifrit/ Dorothy/ Mulesyse/ Ferdinand/ Rosemontis/ Ho’olheyak/ Kirsten.

After the events of Project Horizon, Terra has forever been changed. For just a fleeting moment, every living being in Terra looked up and saw the stars for the first time. The consequences of this aren't totally clear just yet, but it will almost have rippling effects across the world and marks a shift in the game's story as a whole. We also received confirmation of just who the Doctor truly is, and a look behind the curtain of Terra's history. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say that nothing is the same after Lonetrail.

In more specific character terms, though, Saria is the new control of Rhine lab, with Silence as her assistant and ethics advisor. Ifrit is a big girl now, and practically a different character entirely from who she was at the start of the game - seriously, her character arc might be my favorite in the game. Rosemontis has also similarly faced her past and come out stronger, and not only Directors Dorothy and Mulesyse but also Maylander agent Ho'olheyak have come over to Rhodes Island in the chaos after Project Horizon. Finally, Rhodes Island has uncovered the real powers lying behind the scenes of Columbian Politics, but have in turn been noticed themselves. We are no longer in the shadows, and it would be wise to keep that in mind.

#arknights #all quiet under the thunder #what the firelight casts #Invitation to wine #where vernal winds will never blow #under tides #stultifera navis #Mizuki and caerula arbor #il siracusano #guide ahead #near light #Lonetrail #arknights story #arknights spoilers #spoilers

[den-ai-d]

Yay, Invitation to Wine Rerun is here!!! ...no Lee banner though😭

Anyway, I have another gripe:

Why is Shen Lou not an operator???

My goodness, he's so cool though!?!?! I really like these "I'm just a simple old man" types which are—of course—actually badasses. Like, when everyone noticed the sudden rain that preluded his entrance in that one scene in the mountains. UGH, SHOWOFF BASTARD; get over here and give me a hug!!!

Seriously, this game needs more of these playable old gents aside from Hellagur and Młynar. I guess Lee can be added to that list??? And although technically an old timer, Chongyue is too much of a bishie boy to be even considered lol.

#den thoughts #arknights #invitation to wine #shen lou

[itsmearia]

With the Invitation to Wine event going on this is a great time to give some love to this yo-yo friend right here

Invitation to Wine is trivialized by this yo-yo carrier. He makes it super easy. It's his time to shine.

The current event has enemies that break apart when they die and spawn smaller enemies that can't be blocked and must be hit X number of times before they die. Some of them spawn as many as 15 of these things! So you can see how it can get complicated to suddenly hit 15 enemies multiple times each before they get past your line.

Well, Ethan here doesn't care about those things. He hits in an AOE and his skill 1 deals damage over time for a couple seconds to all enemies he hits.

Luckily the dot tick counts as another hit! So our boy hits everything near him, then the dot ticks and ticks and ticks and suddenly things have taken 4 hits in 2 seconds. All of them! Those little medallions that are overwhelming most normal squads? All dead by Ethans yoyo.

The best part is that he's basically free. You get him from red certificates in the shop.

So if you're struggling on this event go grab Ethan and watch as it becomes the easiest event you've ever encountered (until the last level cause F that boss)

#arknights #ethan #invitation to wine #arknights strategy

[exoticalmonde]

Image stolen from Dr. Pinkie who got it from god knows where but I'm here to declare that I succeeded in my adventure into the bottom of Ling's cup and I come out victorious.

With a team of hardened steel and all the blood I could spill to guilt-trip half the team into doing more damage/healing (and to get Chongyue off my back for this morning's training session) , I managed to acquire a Nearl-alter from a unsuspecting owner.

Basically we tried multiple things that could have worked potentially if my characters were stronger, including attempting Ebenholz (it's for the peepos, no we didn't try killing Sui Xiang) and Kroos-alter, Skadi-alter and company. To no avail.

At some point Dr. Kryo came by to offer the assistance of Pozemka in case Kroos-alter was not doing enough damage. Mine is not E2 and Dr. Pinkie was really adamant on using Skalter.

Since none of us have it.

So while I was away I hear those two bicker in the background:

Kryo: "If you're struggling you could always go the Pozemka strat."

Pinkie: "We're doing quite fine, stage by stage."

Kryo: "Or you could use Pozemka."

Pinkie: "Or you can shut your wh*re mouth."

Me: *Wheeze laughing from the kitchen*

Kryo: "You're failling and could use the support."

Pinkie: "Why don't you guide her then?!"

Kryo: "Because I don't know your plan!!"

They love each other though, this is all regular chatter in Rhodes Island, I promise. No operstors or feelings were hurt in the creation of this post.

About operstors actually...

The first... Couple of times... Were eventful.

Sussuro was taken to bed early today for some well-deserved rest.

We started using the training tickets and figured out that if you need some tick damage, it's better to get your best casters. Nobody told me that fastest caster was also an option, of which such are - Click... And Pudding.

At least now I don't remember if Passenger was an option, but chain casters seem to work fine. He's just a little too expensive to put down. Not that Pudding isnt 28DP at E1 mad pots, but... You know. Splash caster kind of cost for a 4 target hit at a speed of Average.

Now every time I see this I feel a headache coming up.

During the last phase, after we took a 10 minute break, I forgot I was meant to play the training thing first and we accidentally succeeded in Challenge mode the normal way.

I still have to farm for 20 more stages for the full medal set.

Speaking of which, GOD the last seconds... Surtur died way too EARLY, not to mention it took multiple attempts to figure out Sui uses his skill on the MELE character which is closest, closest meaning PROXIMITY. So my Surtur got stabbed into the ground twice before we fixed thsa by placing Gravel below her and not below Sui. Just bait as close to the ball as possible.

And as a last resort we stalled and used that ONE block you see behind him. Backstabbing as a last resort, by the wise words of Dr. Pinkie.

Cleared the shop. Cleared the stages.

And also a day ago I got enough primes to get Nian. Mentioning it again since she was also used in a couple of stages and it was a splendid experience. Aak and Hung, you two will get dressed up some other time.

#arknights #arknights event #invitation to wine #doctor of ri shenanigans #friendship #event commentary #boss stage arknights #Sui #Just Surtr it

[daisukoth]

They put their whole pussy in making the NPCs for this event

#arknights #invitation to wine

[linlin24]

I’m drowning in friend requests ever since Invitation to Wine EX levels opened 😂😂. Hope my MVP boys can help everyone destroy those pesky household goods!

#arknights #ethan arknights #jaye arknights #mine #invitation to wine

[un-javi]

#arknights #who is real #invitation to wine #it's a lingcod btw

[no-vacancy-available]

It's funny reading this in a rerun right after Where Vernal Winds Will Never Blow.

#arknights #Invitation to Wine #Arknights Lee #Du Yaoye

[huixing]

Yay!! ♪( ´▽｀) I finally have this set after messing up SO. MANY. TIMES.

Oh and I finally maxed out Kroos’s potential!

#arknights #invitation to wine #this was actually really fun but kind of annoying lol #I’m so glad I finally have the necessary operators for this #kroos arknights #kroos the keen glint

[dasbehemyth]

So in all honesty I saw these medal sets for events and I just loved them, an achievement for yourself, for your own sake saying you did the hardest challenges. And I was thinking for awhile

Man, I'll never have a full set of those. Oh those are cool, wish I had a roster good enough to do that. Well through commitment focus and sheer fucking will

I did do it in fact. My first set. And I'm happy as fuck

#arknights #invitation to wine #medals #this is a huge personal win for me #i even got a trimmed one too

[unseencolours]

李白

就是很想畫

#畫 #影像創作 #繪畫 #鄭雲龍 #將進酒 #李白 #artwork #art #illustration #drawing #doodle #ball point pen art #ball point drawing #some silly touch up with felt tip pen #fanart #zheng yunlong #invitation to wine #li bai

[day-at-rhodes-island]

Okay, correct me if I’m wrong, but Huai is the better translation of Waai right?

So Huai Tianpei = Waai Tianpei, and it’s just a case of the translators not being familiar with the setting, like Silence’s “Saria and I don’t know each other” line?

#arknights #ramblings #waai fu #inconsistency #invitation to wine

[manifestmerlin]

Ah a classic arknights new years event! Many names are dropped! Many people seen! Many words spoken! And none of it made any fucking sense cause they didn't contextualize shit.

#arknights #invitation to wine #hypergryph i know the word count is already kind of high but i am BEGGING for even the barest hint of exposition on whats happening #reading between the lines is only possible when i know what the fuck the lines mean #what the fuck was going to happen to lee? what was ling doing? what was the deal with the goblet? what are all these random dudes for? #like i get the pole mans deal #and i get this has something? to do with a sui bro #but like... was the final boss the bro? was it just a nightmare of the 3 sisters?? #what the fuck was liang even doing?? #merlin plays arknights

[adorablegorilla]

Since the Invitation to Wine event ends in about 34 hours, I thought now would be a good time to make another helpful post about the EX stages for anyone who's been putting them off (totally don't know what that's like haha). Won't cover the first 3 bc EX-1 and 2 are easy and I already made a post about EX-3

EX-4

You'd think with the layout of the stage and the way enemies circle around it would be a good stage to create a stationary defense and let the enemies come to you, except NO, DON'T TRY TO DO THAT BECAUSE

You absolutely CANNOT wait for these guys to come to you. Resistance helps a little, yes, but especially on CM these guys do so much damage that if you let them circle around they'll absolutely destroy your Operators. You're gonna want to be proactive and basically spawncamp these guys with burst damage skills while using fast redeploys and/or Bena to draw their fire.

EX-5

This stage is fairly straightforward. The Lamp Guys and Peacocks spawn from the middle red box, while a bunch of mook enemies spawn from the left. The usual suspects (Ethan, Bibeak, BP, etc) can handle the left side pretty well as long as you put a good amount of burst damage up for the Lamps and Peacocks. Even on CM where you can't deploy on the farthest back tiles you have plenty of space, just don't let the mooks distract you from the Lamps and Peacocks (yes I'm gonna keep calling them that)

EX-6

The Peacocks and Sharpedges will do circles around the middle while the dog reskins try to distract and annoy you. Bring AOE Snipers for the Peacocks and Marksman for their spawns. CM's tripled cost for Casters and Guards unfortunately means Ifrit is only viable on normal mode, but Schwarz and Fartooth are good replacements for taking care of the Sharpedges. As long as you can afford to bring enough damage for the middle Sharpedges the Marksman can take care of the spawns. Be aware that two Sharpedges will attempt to rush the bottom box and break through your defenses, but they give you plenty if time to prepare in between. If you can afford them, Specter S2, Skadi S3, and Surtr S3 are good ways to take care of those two, but if you don't have 60+ DP to spare Kaltsit or Eunectes can also do the trick.

EX-7

Okay I'm gonna be honest, this map is ridiculously easy compared to everything before it. There's a whole lane that every enemy HAS to walk down, and even if you don't have Ifrit the only enemies in this stage that remotely pose a threat to your defense are the Lamps, who give you plenty of time to burst them down or helidrop on them. Heck, they only have a C in Res, just use Utage! So yeah, Utage and other burst dmg ops for the Lamps, and the Usual Suspects in the Mandatory Lane for everything else.

EX-8

It's Dragon Part Two: Boogaloo. This stage isn't exactly easy but it isn't complicated. Bring the Usuals for the mooks and Wisps, debuffs and burst damage to kill the dragon, fast redeploys to bait the tail and bulky ops to tank the laser. You beat this guy once, you can do it again.

#arknights #invitation to wine #long post

[exoticalmonde]

On the topic of skins, whoever made the Kroos alter skin put all their heart and hornyness into it. Her nails are painted. GOSH, now that I look at it, the jade in her hair is so cute, her heels, the dress and the print of it. The anklet.

The koi fish in the pond, the contrast of the blue background with the crimson lanterns. Look at ALL those books just sitting there.

She sits down and reads the book in her hands in her sprite!!! While I would have smacked her upside the head for rolling it up like that, she could probably head shot me with her eyes closed, thus we let her be.

Regarding the event, I've played it up to EX-2 CM and then EX-3 Normal, so there's not much to grind for.

Me: "WOW, look at that fabulous sassy bird that comes my way and mesmerises me until my vanguards are dead because-- Oh would you look at that, it died, but woe, what is this plate slowly and steadily rolling towards the exit semi-floating so none of my snipers do damage to it."

Pinkie: "You just voiced all my concerns the first time I played this gamemode."

I've been wondering between the Aak and Hung skins. I have the Aak skin from CC11s shop, and Hung comes around any anniversary.

But Nian... What if she disappears one day? I didn't expect to get her in the first place but if I have the sister, might as well have the skin huh? I mean, look at her!

Maam, those legs are longer than my cannon lifespan and whiter than my future.

Also the toral primes of skins I want in the future come up to 146... What an unsurmountable number to have at once for me but I also am ready to narrow it down just to the main four suspects. 18 primes each babyyyy *in a depressed tone*

Spalter is so pretty AAAAAA

Shalem is supposedly on the husband list but I mainly need him just for how aesthetically pleasing he is.

There's time in-between them, I suppose.

After Noir-alter I won't be using them for pulls anyways.

#arknights #arknights event #Invitation to wine #arknights skins #kroos arknights #kroos the keen glint #arknights czerny #arknights ebenholz #arknights lumen #arknights enforcer #arknights specter alter #arknights nian #Doctor needs a nappy #And a fat paycheck