Sazh: Heads or Tails? DLC

Sazh: Heads or Tails? DLC

Sazh Katroy is one of the primary protagonists form the original Final Fantasy XIII -- a middle-aged black man who was a soldier and a pilot, as well as a train conductor, and whose stand-out feature for most players is his distinctive afro-style hair in which he keeps an unnamed Chocobo Chick as a pet or possibly companion?

His iconic olive coat over khaki trousers, white button-down shirt, and black buckled engineer boots and the l'Cie mark is on his chest that remains half-hidden under his shirt mark him as a principle character in the story, and his two pistols provide remarkable assistance to Lightning as she worked to solve the mystery of her sister and what was happening to their world...

Much of his personality revolves around his relationship with his young son, Dajh, who he tries and fails to keep safe due to elements that he never appears to fully understand until the end of the first story -- and while that seemed to end happily, when we finally meet him in the sequel things to quickly wrong for him and once again his son goes missing -- with the primary focus of this DLC being (in addition to adding two new Casino games) finding a way to recover him safely.

We pick up the story and begin playing the DLC right at the start of the gate tree, the selection we want being Serendipity ??? AF that is right at the bottom on the far-left of the tree.

-- Welcome to Serendipity --

Standing in the casino Sazh experiences a time-stopping series of mini-events, and then reflects upon the events that lead up to his arriving there in Serendipity.  One moment he is flying along in his transport and the next Dajh is warning him that something is coming -- then all hell breaks loose and he finds himself in the casino...

When Sazh first arrives he meets the enigmatic owner and manager of the casino here, who provides a cryptic welcome, and invites Sazh to save his son -- and himself -- and in the process, perhaps learn that the ultimate goal and the solution to his problem is to collect 30 Fortune Medals...

Bear in mind that you cannot win Fortune Medals from the Slot Machines, but you can amass coins to use for gambling playing it, so you have to decide what you are going to play: Serendipity Poker, Chronobind, and Slot Machines?  The table games are the fastest way to obtain the Medals, but a lucky pull on the slots can pay off a stack of coins... 

The game prompts you to speak with the Owner to collect some coins -- and he gives you a stack of 10,000 coins but no information on what the true cost of those coins could be...  The game tells you that if you run out of coins you can ask him for help again, but there is a limit to how many times you can do that.

Now that you have your initial stack of coins it would be an idea to save your game.  You will notice if you look at your inventory that in addition to the 10K in coins you have from the Owner, you also have whatever your coin balance was from the game, and you have your inventory of items and kit as well...

Hold'em Poker - a shower of coins and Fortune Medals!

-- Serendipity Poker --

The nearby tables offer you the chance to play the game Serendipity Poker -- a game that is based upon  a straight draw game like Texas Hold'em with no card exchanges -- basically the best dealt hand wins, so you have to know when to bet and when to fold...

When the game begins each player is dealt two cards, and then the initial bets are made, then the three cards of the Flop are dealt, you bet, and then the Turn card is dealt and you bet, followed by the River card, and another bet, and then you see who won!

While you can walk away from the game at any time with your coins and winnings in your hands, if you stay and beat out all of the players at the table you can win special bonus prizes as well...

Once the initial cards are dealt you actually hear the comments of the other players -- this can make for slow play, but when you decide to fold you can play through the current game at high speed so you do not have to just sit and wait for the other players to talk and bet...

-- Raking in the Rewards --

Remember that the entire point is to obtain the Fortune Medals that you need to progress this DLC expansion -- a minimum total of 30 Fortune Medals to be exact -- and that may seem like a lot of them if you are thinking that you can only win them one at a time, but that is not actually the case.  In addition to receiving one for winning your first poker game, you also receive bonus Medals for specific actions during the game, such as Winning Streaks and All-In Bets...

The first game of Texas Hold'em can be a fun game but if you end up with the last opponent being a very cautious player then it can be downright boring because it can take as long as two hours to play out, but then the reward is commensurate with the time, believe me!

Playing your three opponents and taking ALL of their money from them earns you a bonus for clearing the opponents at the table -- to the tune of winning the 30,000 coins of your opponents (assuming you started with a kitty of 10K each, you receive a bonus of 20,000 coins for cleaning out your opponents, and you receive a Fortune Medal to commemorate your first win, and the additional bonus Fortune Medals.  To put this in perspective for you, I obtained the following bonus Medals for my first game:

-- 1 Medal to commemorate your first poker win.
-- 1 Medal in recognition of your victory.
-- 5 Medals / 1 for each winning streak.
-- 2 Medals / 1 for each rare hand played.
-- 2 Medals / 1 for every All-In.
-- 2 Medal as a blessing of the goddess.

For a total of 13 Medals for the one Poker game...  Just rinse and repeat until you have more than 30 Medals!

-- Lost Chocbo Chicks --

Now that you have secured the Fortune Medals you need -- do not go and talk to the Owner yet!  Instead head outside and to the building on the lower left that normally houses the Mystic, where you will find instead a Chocolina!  Not only that, but she has a problem and needs your help!  It seems that there is a group of Chocobo Chicks lost in the Casino, and she needs you to help her by finding them and bringing them back to her.

A Chocobo Chick Scavenger Hunt

Talk to her again to learn that the first chick is actually wandering around outside in the lobby by the Choco Races, so go out and you will find it, and talk to it to tame/recruit it.  Returning to her she tips you that the next one is outside somewhere wandering around, so head back into the Lobby and search for it until you find it, then return to the Chocolina for the next hint.

The next location is the casino game room (where you played Poker) -- grab the chick from there and bring it back to the Chocolina, to learn about the love birds -- which you will find in the center of the spinning roulette wheel.

You will need to run back and forth between the two a few times to deliver messages and then bring them together so that they chat...  And then it is time to see the Chocolina again.

The next chick you need to find has been victimized by a conniving chocobo chick it seems... You will find them in the casino game room on one of the empty tables -- you need to figure out which is the victim and talk to it to get it to join you!

When you report back to Chocolina that wraps up the choco-chick wrangling, and then she asks you to answer a question, after which she tells you her secret... 

-- Back to the Casino --

Now that we have managed this mischief, it is time to head back to the Casino Owner and have a chat with him -- after congratulating Sazh the Owner stands back and the world conforms to his desires -- and Dajh shows up!

You get a CS with the Owner in which certain future issues are resolved, though it is still a bit enigmatic... Make of it what you will, Sazh decides that he is not willing to give up and asks to be sent to where he can make a difference.  You can now summon Sazh as one of the monsters on your team and have him fight beside you!  Nice one!