Pokemon Conquest- Conquest One: Burning and Learning (9/9)

During the second turn, Oichi notes that the fire pits sometimes turn off.  Once you’ve taken your turn, Hideyoshi blusters and brags a bit, saying all the kingdoms will be his- presumably he wants to see or use the legendary pokemon as well.

During turn 3, Nagayasu complains about Bidoof, complaining that it’s useless because it can’t handle the lava or fire of the arena.  While he’s somewhat accurate in that it slows him down from joining the other four battlers on the far side of the large lava pit, Oichi is stunned by how he’s insulting his partner.  The first time a Pokemon on your team gets hit, the game points out the ‘hot springs’ squares on the field.  These squares are scattered, usually near fire pits, and when a Pokemon ends its turn in one of them, it heals a little bit of HP and, if burned, gets cured of the burn.  This is especially useful to you, thanks to all the fire damage- and while you don’t really need the help you can abuse it pretty terribly.

Once you win the battle, both pokemon’s moves should be ‘strengthened’ to a rating of +1.  This increases the power of the attacks themselves, causing a drastic upshift in the offensive strength of your Warriors in battle.  Curiously, this increase seems to be tied to Link rating, meaning that it’s basically impossible to lose the power boost to the attack.

Once you are through the post-victory screens, the plot moves on- Hideyoshi stomps about and rages over the loss of his castle- but declares that he’s going to find the legendary pokemon despite no longer having any territory to his name.  With that, he and his Warriors vanish, presumably heading out to find a new fortress to inhabit so they can get back on track for trying to conquer space.  As they head off, Oichi congratulates you over the win, and says that you’ll start making allies soon.... if she can figure out how to do that.

This is when a strange (and positively huge) man shows up out of nowhere, exclaiming in disbelief that you were heading out to conquer new territory without knowing how to add new Warriors and Pokemon to your cause.  While you’re impressive for your age and recent ascension to Warlord, he says, there’s a long way to go if you don’t know how to gain new allies yet.  Oichi and you sulk slightly at that, but the man says that he wasn’t teasing you and actually will teach you what you need to know in order to increase your forces.

Now that you’re done with this segment, the game gives you an opportunity to save... right before the end of the month screen triggers, which is slightly odd timing, but so it goes.