In a perfect world of extremely high level characters and ideal builds a Zodiac will be left behind because of the attack formula.
You have no weapons that add to spells so when your TEC reaches 99 you just have that to go into the formula along with all your skill ups and multipliers. Weapon based attacks have all that plus another 180-230 points from the weapons themselves.
That being said this game is actually the best of the three when it comes to Zodiac balance because Meteor has an absurdly high modifier, keeping it in the game for a long long time. Plus as usual there are a number of enemies who have high phyisical resists and low elemental ones, and plenty of conditional drops that you can only get by not killing them with a physical hit.
The gamefaqs crowd that talks this way is going for theoretical, end game boss killing scenarios. Zodiacs are dead useful in the regular game. Hell one point in Bolt Mastery combined with all their elemental bonuses and an elemental crossbow makes a Zodiac/Arbalist among the best normal attackers for most of the middle part of the game. Meteor is absolutely the best skill available for the middle part of the game. Dark Ether is arguably the single best ability in the game. Only Zodiacs have the TEC score and elemental synergy required to make the three elemental limits some of the best damage for most of the game.
Laugh at anyone who thinks Zodiacs aren't good in this game.
I got the South Banner, and now the guy tells me I can get a tattered flag. I've killed 2 waves of pirates with the banner equipped, and I screwed up and died to the 3rd, and now they don't spawn anymore. Didn't get a flag. Any idea what's going on?
Seriously, this game's floors are much more intrincate than those of II (pre-6th stratum). I think I like it . I could do with a bit less in the way of random encounters, though...
I got the South Banner, and now the guy tells me I can get a tattered flag. I've killed 2 waves of pirates with the banner equipped, and I screwed up and died to the 3rd, and now they don't spawn anymore. Didn't get a flag. Any idea what's going on?
well, i know like fish flag that spawn wave is random
I hate when this happens. I just had a horribly close call against one of the FOEs in the 12th floor, even though I'd already killed a couple of them before with no trouble. Reason? The game decided it would be really funny to see what happened if my Arbalest missed every single shot for seven turns straight. Argh. Thank God I always have emergency Medoras and Amritas on hand.
Anyway, floor mostly mapped, arrived at the boss. Time for re-equipping, and then going for it. Wish me luck.
Last night I got to the boss on the fourth floor and got him down to about 1/10 of his max health. My M/H/B/A/F team was just about to finish him off when he used that ability where he jumps into the mud and cast earthquake to wipe my party. I gave up due to frustration and tried again earlier today. This time I had my Arbalist use the barrage attacks to hit all targets a once when he submerged and that did the trick. The boss battles in general seem more time consuming in this game then they did in the last two. Took me about 15 minutes to take him down.
Ninjabear on
Play Smash Bros 3DS with me!!! Friend Code: 2981-7429-8364
It was the Thunder Dragon. He got tricky near the end because he used a debuff instant kill when he was down on his last legs even when I kept my buff count below the limit (7). I'm just glad he didn't spam it every turn. I'm glad I used Aegis Shield as my Limit since it gave me an extra turn after the breath attack to heal and restore Tp.
Well, beat the third stratum boss. Color me dissapointed. For all the buildup, it was pretty harmless. Okay, so the fact that
its "full" form just happened to be weak to both Pierce and Fire, when my party includes both an Arbalist with armor Pierce and a Zodiac that had Hellfire equipped, certainly helped, but still.
Now, getting the thing's conditional drops, that's going to be trickier.
Just assembled a two Shogun/Buccaneer with Swashbuckling and one Gladiator/Shogun with ridiculous mace and Warrior's Might threesome. Began giant penguin farming at level 16, up to level 30 in almost no time, whee!
Does anyone actually run with a Swashbuckling Shogun in their normal party? I'm leveling them up to possibly swap in, but so far I'm kind of thinking it's a one trick pony for boss fights and otherwise I'll be sticking with my normal team.
wait, what's the level trick this time around? I want to try various party options, but having to level them again and again when I don't like them is getting annoying.
Tcheldor on
League of Legends: Sorakanmyworld
FFXIV: Tchel Fay
Nintendo ID: Tortalius
Steam: Tortalius
Stream: twitch.tv/tortalius
wait, what's the level trick this time around? I want to try various party options, but having to level them again and again when I don't like them is getting annoying.
Do the Sea Quest at the Tower of Victory, you fight a King Penguin. He's not too difficult with a normal party around level 40, and he's super easy if you do the Swashbuckling Shogun + Warrior's Might chaser trick. He gives 44,000 experience per kill, and since you can save between every fight and get your HP/TP restored, it's trivial to farm him.
If you don't know it, the Warrior's Might thing is to make a Shogun, subclass Buccaneer, give them max Swashbuckling and dual wielding. Have a second character (mine is a Gladiator with the crazy mace you get from the First Stratum boss's conditional drop) with Shogun subclass that maxes out the Warrior's Might ability. When the Shogun attacks, he may hit 2 - 8 times depending on how much Swashbuckling procs, up to 4 hits per weapon, and every hit is followed by the other guy doing an instant hit with Warrior's Might.
I actually made two of the Swashbuckling Shoguns, and so every round there's like 4 - 16 hits that proc my Gladiator smashing the penguin for over 1k damage per hit, after Eagle's Eye and Berserker's Vow and with Charge Tactics up Even with misses and low numbers of procs I can usually beat the penguin fast enough to get his conditional drop, which sells for 10k, so you can even make some money while doing it.
wait, what's the level trick this time around? I want to try various party options, but having to level them again and again when I don't like them is getting annoying.
Do the Sea Quest at the Tower of Victory, you fight a King Penguin. He's not too difficult with a normal party around level 40, and he's super easy if you do the Swashbuckling Shogun + Warrior's Might chaser trick. He gives 44,000 experience per kill, and since you can save between every fight and get your HP/TP restored, it's trivial to farm him.
If you don't know it, the Warrior's Might thing is to make a Shogun, subclass Buccaneer, give them max Swashbuckling and dual wielding. Have a second character (mine is a Gladiator with the crazy mace you get from the First Stratum boss's conditional drop) with Shogun subclass that maxes out the Warrior's Might ability. When the Shogun attacks, he may hit 2 - 8 times depending on how much Swashbuckling procs, up to 4 hits per weapon, and every hit is followed by the other guy doing an instant hit with Warrior's Might.
I actually made two of the Swashbuckling Shoguns, and so every round there's like 4 - 16 hits that proc my Gladiator smashing the penguin for over 1k damage per hit, after Eagle's Eye and Berserker's Vow and with Charge Tactics up Even with misses and low numbers of procs I can usually beat the penguin fast enough to get his conditional drop, which sells for 10k, so you can even make some money while doing it.
There's also another one involving the boss in Aeaea if you don't mind doing a soft reset trick.
1. Go to Sea quests and save game.
2. Soft reset or turn off your game and start it back up and load game.
3. Choose Sea quests again but don't save your game.
4. Choose the first quest under Trade City Aeaea.
5. Place only one character in the first slot in the front row.
6. When battle starts, select Escape as your command.
7. If Embrace misses, which it almost always will since it has horrible accuracy even when the character is level 1, the NPC will summon Tiger.
8. ???
9. 28,000 EXP profit for your solo character.
I've tried it and it's pretty much worked 100% of the time. Not sure if it works if two or more people are present in the party though.
wait, what's the level trick this time around? I want to try various party options, but having to level them again and again when I don't like them is getting annoying.
Do the Sea Quest at the Tower of Victory, you fight a King Penguin. He's not too difficult with a normal party around level 40, and he's super easy if you do the Swashbuckling Shogun + Warrior's Might chaser trick. He gives 44,000 experience per kill, and since you can save between every fight and get your HP/TP restored, it's trivial to farm him.
If you don't know it, the Warrior's Might thing is to make a Shogun, subclass Buccaneer, give them max Swashbuckling and dual wielding. Have a second character (mine is a Gladiator with the crazy mace you get from the First Stratum boss's conditional drop) with Shogun subclass that maxes out the Warrior's Might ability. When the Shogun attacks, he may hit 2 - 8 times depending on how much Swashbuckling procs, up to 4 hits per weapon, and every hit is followed by the other guy doing an instant hit with Warrior's Might.
I actually made two of the Swashbuckling Shoguns, and so every round there's like 4 - 16 hits that proc my Gladiator smashing the penguin for over 1k damage per hit, after Eagle's Eye and Berserker's Vow and with Charge Tactics up Even with misses and low numbers of procs I can usually beat the penguin fast enough to get his conditional drop, which sells for 10k, so you can even make some money while doing it.
i'm not there yet but also
if you take one person into that fight and defend the whole way through the ninja will do the 5x shadow clone + move combo and kill the guy for you in 60-140 turns. the 44k exp takes you from lvl 1 to 14 in one fight.
A VERY high level Meteor Zodiac can solo the Penguin King in five turns or so, allowing you to level 3 newbies or one character with two exp farmers.
The deal with the Penguin King fight:
The thing people don't mention about the Penguin King is this. He is weak to all six elements but has an absurd amount of HP. He also does not attack for at least the first four turns, and rarely on the fourth and fifth. The issue is that his one attack is a giant fuck off explosion that will kill most parties. If you do kill him in less then five turns you also get his conditional drop, good for 10,000 gold.
I think I need to advance the Boat missions. I just don't know what I need to do now. I've found a couple places, but can't reach them - one, the game tells me I'd need some way to go through reefs, and the other the game tells me straight on "dude, wait until later". I've only unlocked stuff up to Tortuga, and I have no idea what I should do to advance...
I think I need to advance the Boat missions. I just don't know what I need to do now. I've found a couple places, but can't reach them - one, the game tells me I'd need some way to go through reefs, and the other the game tells me straight on "dude, wait until later". I've only unlocked stuff up to Tortuga, and I have no idea what I should do to advance...
In other news, Fourth Stratum. Holy moly.
Try revisiting some old locations. They'll often have additional tasks for you to complete (which may very well be already done in some cases). The rewards vary, but you may need them to upgrade your ship.
In other new, I really want to get a Shogun already, but having to level it from level 1 is not looking very appealing. I'm thinking I could take one of the level 22 guys I have in reserve with Combat Study, level him up to 30, and Retire him, to get a level 15 Shogun with 4 free skillpoints, because hey, why not :P.
And also... who do I take out? I had intended it to be the Prince, but... while I could do without most of what the Prince does, right now I can't go without the passive healing. I seriously don't think I can survive long enough to clear floors without Monarch March and Veil keeping my dudes going. Blargh. I hate these decisions.
Alexis returned with her group from the Labyrinth early this morning, just before the sun rose. When I asked her about how it went down there she simply shrugged and told me that it could have been worse. Anyway she also managed to pick up a request to find them some kid who got himself lost in the place. I guess doing favours isn’t going to hurt anybody.
Aside from that, I’ve been talking to people at the docks, and there should be a way to reach the back of the lighthouse. I’ll have to go talk to Rook about loaning his ship out for a quick excursion one of these days.
All right, that’s enough talk about work. I heard that a restaurant near the Senatus building serves an excellent fish curry. I’ll go talk to Alexis about whether or not she wants to join me for dinner tonight.
*~*
Adrian
Mood: Infuriated.
Ugh. I finally found out why Master spends so much time down at the Bistro. There’s a bartender there named ‘Missy’ and hers are the biggest I’ve ever seen! And her dress barely covers them up! Does she feel no shame at all?
Bah. Master can do what he wants. It’s not my problem. I need to be prepared for our next Labyrinth trip. I want to go inside there for some training, but I’m not so stupid as to do it alone. I’m not sure who to ask to come with me, though. The knight girl always seems super busy.
Maybe the ninja girl? Or the girl with the crossbow? Come to think of it, I haven’t talked to either of them very much so far. Maybe I should go say hi to them, see if they want to grab a bite or something.
*~*
Alexis
Entry Made: 21st of the month of the Silver Lion, in the Seven Hundred and Fourteenth Year of the Holy Empire
We continue to be bogged down my miscellaneous requests. In addition to the Astrologer in the second floor asking us to keep an eye out for one of her guildmates, one of barmaids in a local eatery has set several tasks upon me as well, all helpfully provided by the local populace.
I could turn these requests down, but I’ve been assured that the rewards will be more than worth it. I suppose I shall have to see for myself. At any rate, the first of these tasks is to help the barmaid herself with collecting ingredients for a new dish.
Not exactly the sort of tasks I thought I would be carrying out when I was sworn in as an Imperial Knight, I have to admit. Then again I never expected to have to set foot inside the Labyrinth, or indeed, Armoroad itself, at all.
In other news, Pure’s foraging abilities have managed to net us a tidy sum of money. I suppose for all his faults, he’s good enough at his work. He just requires the proper motivation, even if said motivation involves threats of physical violence to get him to cooperate. His Majesty’s taken the chance to invite me to dine at one of the more ostentatious restaurants near the heart of the city. It’s an unnecessary expense, but given our recent haul I suppose I can let him indulge himself. I haven’t the heart to tell him that most of the gourmet cuisine in this city turns my stomach. Regardless, I suppose spending some time with his Majesty when we’re not in a combat setting should be pleasant enough.
*~*
Midori
Note to self: Never, never never try the senpuku jutsu in Aman’s Inn again.
My poor head.
Pureauthor on
SS FC: 1334 0950 5927
Platinum FC: 2880 3245 5111
0
HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
edited October 2010
Just a couple notes from my Twitter:
The music that plays when your Etrian Odyssey game is saving could fit in many situations.
WoW queue screens, DMV waiting line, elevators, doctor waiting rooms...
Henroid on
0
HenroidMexican kicked from Immigration ThreadCentrism is Racism :3Registered Userregular
edited October 2010
There's a thread in D&D with a title that made me think of the Butterfly Bistro in a heartbeat. "Do the internet makes us havening less grammer?" I fucking love the way she talks.
I noticed that my Buccaneer has Chase Thrust which it says chases "pierce attacks," and my Arbalist has Volt Barrage which it says does "strike/volt" damage, yet my buccaneer chases it as well. Maybe because crossbows are pierce weapons anyways? Or barrage is actually pierce but says strike? I didn't expect it to happen based on the skill descriptions, though.
I also have no clue why they changed bash to strike.
Xenogears of Bore on
3DS CODE: 3093-7068-3576
0
Mojo_JojoWe are only now beginning to understand the full power and ramifications of sexual intercourseRegistered Userregular
edited October 2010
Weee, killed the first Stratum Boss. I think I was a bit overlevelled (I was four 17s and one 18) as he went down a bit easily, with the only trouble being when he managed to use Earthquake (I had to use a row heal item).
Although, having messed with the new sailing bits: I am unable to do anything but scratch the Ghost Ship. So I think I'll ignore those bosses for now.
Mojo_Jojo on
Homogeneous distribution of your varieties of amuse-gueule
Posts
You have no weapons that add to spells so when your TEC reaches 99 you just have that to go into the formula along with all your skill ups and multipliers. Weapon based attacks have all that plus another 180-230 points from the weapons themselves.
That being said this game is actually the best of the three when it comes to Zodiac balance because Meteor has an absurdly high modifier, keeping it in the game for a long long time. Plus as usual there are a number of enemies who have high phyisical resists and low elemental ones, and plenty of conditional drops that you can only get by not killing them with a physical hit.
The gamefaqs crowd that talks this way is going for theoretical, end game boss killing scenarios. Zodiacs are dead useful in the regular game. Hell one point in Bolt Mastery combined with all their elemental bonuses and an elemental crossbow makes a Zodiac/Arbalist among the best normal attackers for most of the middle part of the game. Meteor is absolutely the best skill available for the middle part of the game. Dark Ether is arguably the single best ability in the game. Only Zodiacs have the TEC score and elemental synergy required to make the three elemental limits some of the best damage for most of the game.
Laugh at anyone who thinks Zodiacs aren't good in this game.
Seriously, this game's floors are much more intrincate than those of II (pre-6th stratum). I think I like it
Anyway, floor mostly mapped, arrived at the boss. Time for re-equipping, and then going for it. Wish me luck.
Level 80 limit feels good man~.
Well, beat the third stratum boss. Color me dissapointed. For all the buildup, it was pretty harmless. Okay, so the fact that
Now, getting the thing's conditional drops, that's going to be trickier.
Ah well. Shogun get.
It's a space station.
No XoB, you are the Ghost Ships.
... etc.
Makes getting conditional drops all the easier.
I've used it so far on:
Does anyone actually run with a Swashbuckling Shogun in their normal party? I'm leveling them up to possibly swap in, but so far I'm kind of thinking it's a one trick pony for boss fights and otherwise I'll be sticking with my normal team.
FFXIV: Tchel Fay
Nintendo ID: Tortalius
Steam: Tortalius
Stream: twitch.tv/tortalius
If you don't know it, the Warrior's Might thing is to make a Shogun, subclass Buccaneer, give them max Swashbuckling and dual wielding. Have a second character (mine is a Gladiator with the crazy mace you get from the First Stratum boss's conditional drop) with Shogun subclass that maxes out the Warrior's Might ability. When the Shogun attacks, he may hit 2 - 8 times depending on how much Swashbuckling procs, up to 4 hits per weapon, and every hit is followed by the other guy doing an instant hit with Warrior's Might.
I actually made two of the Swashbuckling Shoguns, and so every round there's like 4 - 16 hits that proc my Gladiator smashing the penguin for over 1k damage per hit, after Eagle's Eye and Berserker's Vow and with Charge Tactics up Even with misses and low numbers of procs I can usually beat the penguin fast enough to get his conditional drop, which sells for 10k, so you can even make some money while doing it.
t EVOL: Check the walls of Narmer's room very carefully.
There's also another one involving the boss in Aeaea if you don't mind doing a soft reset trick.
2. Soft reset or turn off your game and start it back up and load game.
3. Choose Sea quests again but don't save your game.
4. Choose the first quest under Trade City Aeaea.
5. Place only one character in the first slot in the front row.
6. When battle starts, select Escape as your command.
7. If Embrace misses, which it almost always will since it has horrible accuracy even when the character is level 1, the NPC will summon Tiger.
8. ???
9. 28,000 EXP profit for your solo character.
I've tried it and it's pretty much worked 100% of the time. Not sure if it works if two or more people are present in the party though.
The deal with the Penguin King fight:
The thing people don't mention about the Penguin King is this. He is weak to all six elements but has an absurd amount of HP. He also does not attack for at least the first four turns, and rarely on the fourth and fifth. The issue is that his one attack is a giant fuck off explosion that will kill most parties. If you do kill him in less then five turns you also get his conditional drop, good for 10,000 gold.
In other news, Fourth Stratum. Holy moly.
Try revisiting some old locations. They'll often have additional tasks for you to complete (which may very well be already done in some cases). The rewards vary, but you may need them to upgrade your ship.
In other new, I really want to get a Shogun already, but having to level it from level 1 is not looking very appealing. I'm thinking I could take one of the level 22 guys I have in reserve with Combat Study, level him up to 30, and Retire him, to get a level 15 Shogun with 4 free skillpoints, because hey, why not :P.
And also... who do I take out? I had intended it to be the Prince, but... while I could do without most of what the Prince does, right now I can't go without the passive healing. I seriously don't think I can survive long enough to clear floors without Monarch March and Veil keeping my dudes going. Blargh. I hate these decisions.
Entry Nine
*~*
Alexis returned with her group from the Labyrinth early this morning, just before the sun rose. When I asked her about how it went down there she simply shrugged and told me that it could have been worse. Anyway she also managed to pick up a request to find them some kid who got himself lost in the place. I guess doing favours isn’t going to hurt anybody.
Aside from that, I’ve been talking to people at the docks, and there should be a way to reach the back of the lighthouse. I’ll have to go talk to Rook about loaning his ship out for a quick excursion one of these days.
All right, that’s enough talk about work. I heard that a restaurant near the Senatus building serves an excellent fish curry. I’ll go talk to Alexis about whether or not she wants to join me for dinner tonight.
*~*
Adrian
Mood: Infuriated.
Ugh. I finally found out why Master spends so much time down at the Bistro. There’s a bartender there named ‘Missy’ and hers are the biggest I’ve ever seen! And her dress barely covers them up! Does she feel no shame at all?
Bah. Master can do what he wants. It’s not my problem. I need to be prepared for our next Labyrinth trip. I want to go inside there for some training, but I’m not so stupid as to do it alone. I’m not sure who to ask to come with me, though. The knight girl always seems super busy.
Maybe the ninja girl? Or the girl with the crossbow? Come to think of it, I haven’t talked to either of them very much so far. Maybe I should go say hi to them, see if they want to grab a bite or something.
*~*
Alexis
Entry Made: 21st of the month of the Silver Lion, in the Seven Hundred and Fourteenth Year of the Holy Empire
We continue to be bogged down my miscellaneous requests. In addition to the Astrologer in the second floor asking us to keep an eye out for one of her guildmates, one of barmaids in a local eatery has set several tasks upon me as well, all helpfully provided by the local populace.
I could turn these requests down, but I’ve been assured that the rewards will be more than worth it. I suppose I shall have to see for myself. At any rate, the first of these tasks is to help the barmaid herself with collecting ingredients for a new dish.
Not exactly the sort of tasks I thought I would be carrying out when I was sworn in as an Imperial Knight, I have to admit. Then again I never expected to have to set foot inside the Labyrinth, or indeed, Armoroad itself, at all.
In other news, Pure’s foraging abilities have managed to net us a tidy sum of money. I suppose for all his faults, he’s good enough at his work. He just requires the proper motivation, even if said motivation involves threats of physical violence to get him to cooperate. His Majesty’s taken the chance to invite me to dine at one of the more ostentatious restaurants near the heart of the city. It’s an unnecessary expense, but given our recent haul I suppose I can let him indulge himself. I haven’t the heart to tell him that most of the gourmet cuisine in this city turns my stomach. Regardless, I suppose spending some time with his Majesty when we’re not in a combat setting should be pleasant enough.
*~*
Midori
Note to self: Never, never never try the senpuku jutsu in Aman’s Inn again.
My poor head.
Platinum FC: 2880 3245 5111
They can't keep their sword names straight and have different names for the same physical elements.
Same with the description of time on the limit breaks.
Everything about the skill trees is a mess, though, so what's one more fuck-up?
I also have no clue why they changed bash to strike.
Although, having messed with the new sailing bits: I am unable to do anything but scratch the Ghost Ship. So I think I'll ignore those bosses for now.