Final Fantasy Record Keeper
[Final Fantasy Record Keeper] Is actually a pretty fun mobile free-to-play game for iOS and Android. It's not perfect by any means, but it's a HUGE improvement over such duds as All The Bravest. It's a walk down memory lane with a simple ATB style combat system with a surprising amount of depth and strategy. There is a new event every week, featuring your favorite characters and stages from Final Fantasy history, so it never gets old, and it IS free to try, so give it a shot if you have some time to spare. Just don't give them any of your money.
How naive I was about this little game.
This is the thread for talking about Square Enix's F2P Mobile game Final Fantasy Record Keeper (FFRK) for iOS and Android. Initially met with skepticism after some of SE's lackluster F2P entries in the past, it has grown in scope and popularity to the point where it gets as much discussion as any other mainline Final Fantasy game.
The game is a pretty basic Active Time Battle system. You can take up to 5 characters, made up of all your favorites from past games (and one original starter character) as you journey through the cliff notes version of all the Final Fantasy games. Each Final Fantasy game is a world, made up of dungeons with several stages. Each stage requires you to spend stamina to attempt them. Stamina recharges at a rate of 1 every 3 minutes. There are also limited time events that occur every week featuring additional stages, characters, and rewards.
There is a surprising depth of strategy to this game, as each character can equip different combinations of equipment and abilities, allowing for many different approaches to tackling some of the at times quite intense challenges. Characters and equipment also get bonuses if you match them to the world you're in (for example, Cloud gets a bonus in FF7 stages, as does anyone equipping his Buster Sword).
The F2P comes in the form of the in-game currency, Mythril, which allows you to pull powerful relics from reward banners. Mythril also allows you to recharge stamina, and to try again if you happen to be defeated in a stage. You can spend real money on Gems which have the same function as Mythril, though refreshingly for a F2P game it's possible to clear all content without spending a dime. This is thanks to several quality of life features implemented by DeNa, chief among them the Friend Summon system. Additionally, rather generous amounts of free Mythril are available between a combination of login bonuses, stage completions, event participation and quest completion.
Tips and information for new players starting out;
1) Quests.
Check the quests before you enter records and before you craft any ability. The quests, save leveling ones, do not take into account anything you have. So if a quest is to make Fire Strike and you already made it, you will have to make another to complete the quest. You can find this as a circle icon in the upper right on the Home screen.
2) Stamina.
You can see the current / maximum stamina numerically in the upper right corner of your Home screen. Below that is an orange bar that shows the same thing, but below that bar is a set of 5 hexagons representing your current Stamina Shards. When you get 5 Stamina Shards, you refill your stamina to full and your maximum goes up by 1. The filled in hexagons show you how many stamina shards you have towards the next stamina refill and maximum +1. It is to your benefit to collect that fifth shard when you're running out or empty of Stamina. Efficiency is good!
3)Record Info.
When reading about the record in question, several tabs will be available with story, reward and boss info. Here you can read about the story background, rewards, and boss strategies as well as any medal requirements.
Upon completing any given stage in a record, your performance will be ranked. For any stage without a boss, you can earn up to 9 medals. You will lose medals if more than one party member dies, or if the party takes too much damage or uses too many actions to clear the stage. Earn enough medals and you will gain the Expert or Champion rating for the stage, which provides 150% and 200% experience, respectively.
Upon finishing the entire record, there are 3 reward levels; Completion, First Time Completion and Mastery. You can get the Completion bonus every time you complete that record. However, the other two can only be achieved once and typically include excellent rewards. To attain Mastery rewards, you must have earned 83.33% (5/6th) of all medals within the record. Remember those boss medal requirements? Each gives 3 medals if completed or 0 medals if not, so for records with few or only one stage, boss medal requirements can be crucial for obtaining Mastery rewards.
4) Realm Synergy.
Every character and every item comes from a specific realm. When you go into a record for a realm, characters from that realm are treated as if they are 10 levels higher. Items from that realm are significantly boosted in stats, provided the item itself is leveled up. If you're going into an FFVII record, it's a good idea to bring Cloud. It's a great idea to bring someone carrying the Buster Sword. It's a fantastic idea to bring Cloud carrying his own Buster Sword!
The boost from synergized items is stronger than the boost from synergized characters, so it's good to collect and maintain a spread of items from all realms. You will accumulate this over time, so don't worry too much.
5) Events.
Typically, there's 1 or 2 events running at any given time. These events start at a very low difficulty that even first day players can participate in, and end at very high difficulties that even longtime veterans can have trouble with. Rewards for completing event stages can include new or returning characters and their Memory Crystals (used to break level caps), weapons, armor or accessories from the event's realm, orbs, upgrade materials and of course Mythril. Events typically run for about two weeks and overlap, and you should definitely try to complete as much of each event as possible.
6) Daily Dungeons.
Each day has a specific set of 1 or 2 dungeons. You can only get the First Time Completion and Mastery rewards once, same as the records, and those rewards don't refresh from week to week. So if you complete a stage of the Sunday dungeon, next Sunday it will still show them as all completed (though you could still farm the dungeon for normal drops or experience.)
Monday through Saturday, the daily dungeons have rewards for and can be used to farm orbs, upgrade materials or Gil. The Sunday dungeons feature battles with a tremendous amount of experience. To put it into some context, the Heroic stage of a Monday-Saturday dungeon gives around 9400 exp to be split to the party, which the experience dungeon gives up to 70,000!
7) Relics.
The Relics page, accessible via shortcut on the bottom right of most screens, is where one can "pull" from a variety of "banners" for items. Banner pulls are always at least 3* rarity, with a lesser chance at 4* rarity and a ~10% chance at 5* rarity. Doing so costs Mythril (in game currency) or Gems (purchased with real $$$).
Banners are typically linked to current Events, and every banner has featured 5* relics. If you're lucky enough to pull a 5* item, most of the time it will be one of the featured relics, but there's still a chance it won't be.
One can do a single pull for 5 Mythril, a triple pull for 15 Mythril or an 11 pull for 50 Mythril. Single pulls allow you to stop if you're lucky and hit something you wanted, but 11 pulls give you the most bang for your metaphorical buck. Your odds of drawing a 5* item are the same no matter how many items you pull at once and no matter which currency you use to pay for them.
FFRK Acronyms 101
MC - Memory Crystal [Item to break a characters level 50 limit. MC2 is used to break their level 65 limit.]
RM - Record Materia [New equipment type once MC is used. RM slot unlocked by breaking characters levels. RMs are acquired from level broken characters in a variety of ways]
SB - Soul Break [Think Limit Break from FF7, new ones can be learned by character specific 5* relics]
SG/SSII - Sentinel Grimoire/Stone Skin 2 [Also refereed to as Walls, either is a massive defensive SB]
SSB - Super Soul Break [Like an SB except they will also bestow a permanent stat up to the specific character when learned]
BSSB -Burst Super Soul Break [Like an SSB except it changes Attack and Defense commands to something else for a limited time]
M_O/G_O - Major Orbs/Greater Orbs [the middle _ represents which type of orb between Fire, Ice, Lightning, Earth, Non-Elemental, Dark, Holy, White, Black, Power, Summon]
_*++ - Blank is a number 1-5 which represents an items base rank (not combined). Every plus after the * represents how much its been combined. [A 3*++ will show up as a 5* in game but will be only about as powerful as a 4*. Rule of thumb is every item combination adds about half a rarity level of power.]
RS - Realm Synergy [Character or Item matches dungeons realm ie Cloud in FF7 dungeon or Blitzballs in FFX dungeon. This adds about 10 levels of stats to a character or about a rarity level in power to an item]
How can I learn more?
Mister P's PDF is a compilation of super useful information about FFRK. Ability damage multipliers, character skillsets, super break details, upcoming event information, etc etc.
Kongbakpao has a ton of useful information about a ton of things. Tons!
A while ago, FFRK added a friend summon system. We have
a spreadsheet here you can plug your friend code into, and find the friend code of other PAers. In this spoiler is the old list of codes for reference purposes.
92th - El Fantastico
9BSW - jdarksun
9X5G - grove
9rRG - mackenzier
9EBA - Zerozaki Ishiki
913F - shamus
e7U2 - silence1186
9wC6 - Bluecyan
er3u - ResIpsaLoquitur
eSvR - Ilpala
99ZD - DrCongo
ecfN - Delphinidaes
ehpD - SutibunRi
e4XB - Maytag
QNeN - Enlong
9w7W - Billmaan
QdTv - SwashbucklerXX
GNqD - shoeboxjeddy
q7h5 - lionheart_m
9QDP - urahonky
Qjtu - BaywatchDave
GckH - Shadowfire
3sWN - A steak!
2EZ6 - Cirira
q4X6 - romantic undead
7gNG - peetsnack
zcsi - initiatefailure
Q4Dd - korodullin
GbSH - Geddoe
f7MM - maguano
3EnU - manetherenwolf
Fofd - savant
u6BN - Rius
Posts
FFVII-AC - "A Lone Wolf's Lament"
FFVIII - "A Meeting Beyond Time"
Current Special Banners:
Dr. Mog's Beginner's Choice - This banner can only be pulled on once, and only with an 11-pull. It has the standard odds for getting a 5* relic, and the featured relics have either;
- Character Soul Breaks for characters unlocked very early
- Shared Soul Breaks that are useful for any party (AoE Heal, Protectga, Shellga)
- Shared Soul Breaks that provide AoE attacks
Additionally, after pulling on the banner you can choose one 5* relic, from a predetermined list, to be added to your inventory. The list includes one relic from each realm and has some duds and some great picks.Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
You'd want Stop on two different characters so that it serves as a backup if one cast misses
About Ultimate Exdeath, how much was Gilgamesh doing per hit? With Full Break + Boost, my Gilgamesh was doing ~ 7k. Also, I keep getting hit by AoE spells, including dispel =\
Streaming 8PST on weeknights
Sadly I've only beaten the boss rush on the current event, right now i'm trying to farm double hit >.<
On the PLUS side I got RM3 for Keeper, and since I don't have Mako Might yet (still need to get to those dungeons) I'm pretty happy about that as I can finally get a consistent Wall up via SG.
Each piece of the puzzle is slowly coming together. My main issues now are getting the hones in I need on some of the more staple abilities.
Official PA Forums FFXIV:ARR Free Company <GHOST> gitl.enjin.com Join us on Sargatanas!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r7tjm3MCC04
With all Free Equipment master. I'm not going to try it until festive is over so I can get some more free levels.
Or, just put them both on the same mage and finish faster since you are having another 10kish damage from retaliation. Can go either way. Bring Blindna or Esuna. This will drastically cut down your S/Ls. I'd put a damage accessory on cloud, and drop Curaga. Its possible you'll have something to cure, but by the time the cure goes off you'll likely eat a 4k AOE Atomic rays or something so why bother.
I know I saw it mentioned on reddit last night that some people weren't (or whenever, time is like a foreign language to me right now), but for the two(?) sets we've gotten so far I haven't gotten any of those orbs.
Unrelated, can someone give me the rundown on why Bartz is apparently considered super powerful? There is clearly something I'm missing. He's not bad, but I just don't see anything that puts him above and beyond to the point he is regularly mentioned as god-tier. I know he gets his BSSB fairly early, but unless his god-ness comes from unique relic SB's, I feel really lost on this one.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
His (Burst/Super) Soul Breaks are very good, so he can also run Steal Power + Life Siphon and use his SB every 3-4 turns if you put Tidus's RM3 on him.
That said, he does not work in Retaliate or Mage teams at all, so that's why he can seem underwhelming.
I counted my orbs before and after collecting and mine went up. Did you do the same?
Also to anyone who says FFV synergy isn't important because they don't get many events, they have a ton of elite dungeons going up to 140 difficulty in the next Dungeon Update. And there is more 5 dungeons in the one after that one too.
absolute shit all. not pulling again for quite a while.
Well, fml. As if the FFV dungeons didn't already feel naturally unbalanced somehow in terms of difficulty. Ah well, brute force all the things!
Steam: TheArcadeBear
Keep in mind dungeon difficulty level isn't the same as event, so a 140 Ultimate Exdeath, for instance, is harder (stat and ability wise) than the dungeon 140 difficulty. It's the trash that'll having you wanting to throw your phone.
Origin: Galedrid - Nintendo: Galedrid/3222-6858-1045
Blizzard: Galedrid#1367 - FFXIV: Galedrid Kingshand
Should I try a 3-weapon pull on the FFV banner? I could really use Faris's, Lenna's, Bartz's, or Gilgamesh's weapons. But should I be saving up instead? Hmm...
edt: Aw dammit, there's two banners? So I'd have to choose between trying for Lenna or for Faris? Argh.
Has anyone else spent Mythril on Ability inventory?
Thank you super smash bros festival, you will be remembered fondly.
Edit: Got the Sand Worm, but didn't Master him. My Tidus is level 1! That's ok, though; I won't be mastering Cecil or Sand Worm, but I can live without the upgrade mat and 2x mythril. I'm moving on to Behemoth and expect to Master him, so I'll get both of the event's accessories and that's fine by me.
MC2s will be Rinoa, Cloud, Tyro, Tidus. Don't care about Squall, don't see the need for P. Cecil.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
I know I wanted to save Mythril for a while, but I might scrounge up as much Mythril as I can before her event ends, then pull on that banner.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
I am at 186/190 for abilities and I believe I have a problem... I know logically I'll never need my old blizzard r3, but I guess at one point I thought it was worth holding out for orb conversion. Then I never bothered to look at what I was "saving".
A sampling of the abilities I thought were a good idea to save:
One of every 1 *elemental magic R3
Shell and protect R2 and R4 respectively
3 different slows... I have no idea, event reward maybe?
Silence
2 Bomb spells 2nd one was for the quest
Blade bash r4
2 salves r3 (those were great when Tyro was the best healer around)
1 fira, 2 blizzaras and 3 thundaras
Bio r2 ruin R1 dia r4
2 Dragons and 2 Kirin a (keeping one of the Kirin though)
3 of each Fire strike, thunder strike and aero strike
Only 2 of blizzard and water strike though.
Charge
Venom attack and two dark attacks
Three jumps and a death strike
Now I'm down to 140, which is probably a much healthier number. Probably still don't need all the -aga spells but I'll clean house in another six months...
Currently 207/225 equipment, 127/130 abilities. Upgrade materials no longer counting helped a lot.
Having SG available in the party and Advance in the RW slot helped me burn through phase 1. Took a whole lot of S/L to dodge the dispel and multiple AoE.
Streaming 8PST on weeknights
Also why does everyone love PCecil so much?
Rinoa is the first Black Mage to 80, so maybe take her MC2.
Speaking of which! Woke up this morning and crafted Shellga, then one shot Behemoth with Advantaliate. Took a quick look at Omega, and it's maybe possible I could kill it if RNG is on my side, but it'd definitely require crafting a second R3 Stop and would be helped by creating R2 Thundaga Blade.
I didn't plan ahead very well or I would have used my Vale time to level two more Auto Haste RMs and an Auto Reflect RM.
I'll probably let this one go, to be honest... But I'll be thinking about trying it anyway.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
So, between now, and the Lightning BSSB event, just counting daily log ins and the 10 mithril we get per event, we'll have at least 1,105 Mythril total.
I don't think that's enough for the Lightning Banner.
I've been playing casually, but now that the interface is much, much, much improved (it was my biggest turnoff to the game), I'd like to play a little more regularly. Problem is, I have no idea what I should be prioritizing as far as leveling characters. Is there a group of X characters I should be prioritizing first? Characters I have soul break equipment for? Characters from certain realms? Characters I have memory crystals for?
Also to feed into all those questions, I've got the 4 character/MC1 pulls from the Vale of Memories, who should I be using those for?
Sorry if these are basic, but most of the guides I've found have been "Here's the abilities you should be farming" or "Here's some team comps" without actually recommending who to use.
Until you really get into the meta game, you want a balanced party, not unlike you would in a regular final fantasy game. A fighter with good hp, a good damaging melee character, a dedicated black mage, dedicated white mage, and a support/red mage. 'Core' characters', that is, characters whos names are just their class (Black Mage, Knight, Summoner) have much lower stats than named characters from FF games, so don't really focus on those characters until you start getting others to level 50 and can start level breaking them.
For your character uses from VoM, just grab characters you like, keeping in mind the balanced group makeup. There's really no "best" character, though Cloud certainly gets the most attention from the devs, so all other things being equal, he's usually ahead of the curve. As for the rest, though, just use who you like, from the FF games you enjoy playing the most.
Which character SB items do you have? There are very few truly "terrible" or "unusable" characters, I should think. Some of them have stronger alternatives with similar skill sets, but that's not a huge dealbreaker.
Generally, if you have a unique SB and MC1 for a character, it's probably a good idea to level them up. Realm Synergy can make nearly any character useful.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
There are a few other characters who fall outside of that who are greatly beneficial to have leveled. Josef from FF2. Luneth from FF3. That would be a good place to start.
In a nutshell, you want to build a team of people who can cover the various ability types. You will want a Samurai (such as Sephiroth or Auron). You will want a combat guy (like Cloud or Squall). You will want a spellblade (Celes, Cloud). You will want a White Mage (Aerith, Yuna, Vanille). You will want a Black Mage (Vivi, Lulu, Ashe, Rinoa). You will want a support (Sasz, Faris). You will want a Knight (Paladin Cecil, Steiner, Seifer).
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
https://www.reddit.com/r/FFRecordKeeper/comments/3thgk4/character_tier_list_japan_version/
If you've logged in today, yesterday, and the day before, and continue to log in after noon PST, 6 PST and 9 PST, you get increasing amounts of mythril and growth eggs, totaling 10 mythril, 5 major growth eggs, 15 greater growth eggs, 20 growth eggs, and 6 greater orbs of each type (provided you login for each reward). and that's not counting regular daily login rewards
I found that in the early - mid game, it was my weapon options that determined the characters I used. I pulled one of Wakka's 5-star balls fairly early, so he became my Support character (even though you don't really need someone with Support abilities until you get the Breakdowns). I also had a pretty good bow and glove, so characters like Fran, Lenna, Tifa, and Snow got a good bit of rotation.
Just don't swap out characters too often until you have a party of level 50s, maybe even 65s. That way you have a "go-to" group of characters you can pull in to help overcome difficult bosses or get you farther in events. From there, I think the best thing to do is diversify so that you have several characters from every realm to help tackle tough elite dungeons or event content (realm synergy ftw).
Current Party:
Wakka - Lv. 51/65
Vanille - Lv. 50/50
Cyan - Lv. 50/50
Vivi - Lv. 51/65
Other partially leveled characters:
Squall - 42
Arc - 34
Amarant - 34
Rydia - 33
Current SB items:
Shear Trigger (Fated Circle - Squall) - Mastered
Kotetsu (Bushido Dragon - Cyan) - Mastered
Kaiser Knuckles (Rising Phoenix - Sabin)
Scissor Fangs (Aura - Amarant)
Oak Staff (Doublecast Venom - Vivi) - Mastered
All-Rounder (Attack Reels - Wakka) - Mastered
Minerva Buster (Trance Flood - Terra)
Non/Shared SB 5* Items:
Danjuro - 5*
Gold Sword - 5*
Evil Lantern - 5*
Blitz Helm - 5*
Witch's Hat - 5*
I've also got some random 4+ I use for synergy bonus.
@Lucascraft Why Josef/Luneth? Stats?
They're both decent characters. Josef is a strong monk with a very high natural attack stat, and Luneth is a spell blade, so he's good against bosses with elemental weaknesses. But the main reason is what was stated above, harvesting their Record Materia.
Anyway you have a lot of good fist weapons, so you might want to keep a monk around. They're not bad, and you have a pretty large number of options, too, all of which are good. Snow can half-Knight for you, so you could consider that, but Sabin and Amarant are more obvious choices since you have their relics.
It seems you have a really solid main party at this point; if you can, consider swapping out those level-capped 50s for other characters in similar roles. You can rotate Vanille back in later when you get her memory crystal (probably available at the upcoming Lightning MC2 event). Arc is a solid replacement that you already have half-leveled.