Blade & Soul - Grand Enchantment (Gon Outfit) Mod

Some time in early May, a patron requested for the Gon Grand Enchantment outfit, so we will be looking at this mod in this week's post. There is almost no need to mention anything about the origin of the outfit, or how to obtain it because, I am sure that every player would recognize it as Zulia's outfit and knows where to get it.

But for the sake of newbies, especially those that create level 60 character from the start (and thus, skipped lots of story contents 😅 ), the Grand Enchantment can randomly dropped off the Final Boss - Hive Queen in Temple of Eluvium raid dungeon (a.k.a. Vortex Temple - VT) or bought from NPC vendors at the nearby Dasari Garden Trade Post after defeating the Hive Queen ten times.

What puzzles me the most is not that exaggerated huge ribbon that hangs at the back of he outfit but the name of it. If we followed the storyline closely, we will know that Zulia, or rather Sanzu, is also known as the Grand Enchantress - one of the original Eight Masters. Being the leader of the Aransu clan, the Grand Enchantress - Sanzu actually wears a red-white outfit known as the Aransu Apprentice.

You can see Sanzu a.k.a. Zulia in both versions of her outfits in this video below.

In Blade & Soul, outfits often play an important role of determining who the wearer represents and what they stands for. The Aransu clan's uniform is unique in it's utilization of diamond symbols and red-white color tone. Sanzu's uniform is also similar in that sense, although there are some design differences. However, the Grand Enchantment, which relates to the Grand Enchantress, seems way off with the color cyan replacing the red. 

The storyline did not reveal how exactly Sanzu eventually became Zulia. But from bits and pieces of information, it seems to be that Sanzu along with the rest of the Eight Masters challenged the Dark Emissary Jinsoyun to a fight that ended with Sanzu's sacrifice. The rest of the Eight Masters escaped to find and help the prophesized hero (the player) who will eventually defeat Jinsoyun. 

After the defeat, Sanzu might have been saved or resurrected by Mushin who then use her as a pawn in his proxy war. After the resurrection, Sanzu discarded her Aransu identity and adapted her alter ego Zulia, named after the founder of her clan - Zulia Aransu. With that, she also discarded the red-white Aransu Apprentice outfit and began to wear the cyan-white Grand Enchantment.

In my opinion, the red-white version should be the one to be named Grand Enchantment, since it is the version that is worn by Grand Enchantress Sanzu. The cyan-white version might be named Mushin's Puppet. 😆 But that might give away the plot. 😅

But enough about the rant. Let's take a look at the original Gon Grand Enchantment below.

Front View - Original Outfit

The exaggerated ribbon aside, the Grand Enchantment is actually bits and pieces of parts worn over the inner clothes. For example, the apron or shroud at the front torso.

One of the other parts is the cotton leggings.

Front Close-up View - Original Outfit

Then, the trumpet sleeves or maybe elbow guards that is also separate from the main piece.

Rear View - Original Outfit

That is what I call an exaggerated ribbon. 😅

Rear Close-up View - Original Outfit

Side View - Original Outfit

Side Close-up View - Original Outfit

If we look closer, we can see that the separate pieces are all tied down by lots of strings and knots. This is the other unique design of Aransu clan uniform.

Looking back, I had done the Jin Grand Enchantment mod way back in 2017. But I have not written a post on it because it was not made available to players yet, and I made it to get back at Zulia for what she did to the Hongmoon school... Okay... I also hated her horrible mocking laughter. 😠

In the Jin (Zulia is a Jin in case you did not know) mod, I have shortened the front and back aprons, plus made the sides of the bra translucent. Later in a revised mod, a patron requested to have the huge ribbon removed.

One year on, I decided to do something different on the Gon mod. Although I still shortened the apron, I kept the front portion longer. And instead of a translucent layer on the sides of the bra, I gave it a laced layer.

Let's take a look at the modified version below.

Front View - Modified Outfit

Front Close-up View - Modified Outfit

The front apron has been shortened and now has a tapered end instead of square.

Rear View - Modified Outfit

Rear Close-up View - Modified Outfit

Hmm... I think I made the back apron too short. And that is after I made the effort to extend it... I blame it on the inherent Gon's butt. 😅

Side View - Modified Outfit

Oh! I kept the ribbon. 😆

Side Close-up View 1 - Modified Outfit

Next, the laced bra. Check the image below if it is not clear enough.

Side Close-up View 2 - Modified Outfit

I kept the bottom back portion of the bra because there is supposed to be a groove at the area where the breasts connects to the torso. It might look weird if I laced the whole area, so I kept the cloth there to pretend that it is hiding the groove behind it. 😅 

We have reached the end of this post. Check the video for a closer look at the mod. I have simplified the video to a before/after look style without too many fanciful stuff because I don't really know if people are interested to watch those. 😰

Curious case of missing video

Sorry guys. There will temporary be no video. Not because I am slacking or lazy, but something curious happened to my LICENSED copy of video editor which prohibits me from getting the video out. If you are not interested to hear my rant, you should stop reading now. 😓  

You have been warned.

As written in the last part of the blog, the video is all done up and ready for exporting. And then... the video editor crunched up a video with missing footage at the front as you can see in the video below. The front portion of the video is missing where you can see the title Blade & Soul. I will not be publishing this video in public domain on YouTube. It is only viewable for people with the link.

After going back to try to fix the video, the editor suddenly gave up and crashed on me, while putting up a dialog to perform an auto update to apply bug fixes. I guess... "OK, let it do the update. What could go wrong?"

But after the update, the editor prompted me with "You have been using trial version of YYY editor for a long time and you should purchase the actual version." (something along that line) and provided me with a link. I was like "What the hell is this? I paid for a licensed software and now it is asking me to purchase (with discounted rate at US$20+ that is, it would be close to $40 for my currency 😦 ) this new update version where they apply a bug fix?". I tried applying my original license key but the updated editor rejected it as a key for older version of the editor. 😲

There is no way I am paying for another license while I am making these videos to show audience for free. So I emailed the developer and they replied (at least they still get back to me within 12hrs) that I can uninstall and reinstall the old version. 😳 So, that's it... The old version still got that same bug where it can't generate the front portion of the video under certain criteria.

If you are wondering why I bothered buying the professional license in the first place. Well, the trial version cannot export the video in mpeg or higher quality. I wanted the video to look good, so I purchased the license thinking of it as a one-off expense. Didn't thought they could pull a stunt like that... But imagine this. If I am supposed to be a professional video editor and have a tight deadline to meet, I would have no choice but to purchase the new license, with this seemingly timely bug that appears at the most crucial moment...  😨 

This is depressing... Seeing how I did all these for free but people out there are just trying to suck up all the money in any way possible... 😩

If you have read everything up to here... Sorry for making you read this. But also thanks for lending an eye. 😥