|
Yay, an Etrian Odyssey LP! The series is one of my favorites, though I have to ashamedly admit that I never managed to beat EO1 without any sort of cheating device. The FOEs in this game are probably the "weakest" in the series but some of the bosses are absolute nightmares. In EO2 they removed exp from FOEs so there's more incentive to just run from them and come back later to kill them for materials. Also I finished EO2 without cheating, but still had to consult FAQs for the postgame. Etrian Odyssey 3 is just fantastic and I highly recommend it, it's the first title in the series that I managed to complete without any maps/faqs, it felt really nice to beat the postgame stratum without any help. Except for that boss of course, but that is a story for another time. Also Etrian Odyssey 3 probably has the best FOE track out of the three games, shame that the one in the first game is so dull.
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 14:06
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 20, 2024 05:20 |
|
|
Death Dealer posted:Although I have to say, the Monk does some decent damage on top of decent healing so it's pretty nice to not just have your healer defending when everyone is capped off. So, the other point I wanted to make is that the Medic becomes a physical powerhouse in the late game with the use of the right skills and equipment, so just like the Monk in 3 (and War Magus in 2), you don't ever have to have your healer sitting idly by. I'd start putting the Medic in the front line at around the midgame if you go that route. One thing that I kind of discovered while replaying EO 1 is that pretty much and class and any "skill path," so to speak, is viable for the main game, and probably through most of the non-boss postgame, as long as you focus on something rather than constantly changing your mind about what you want to do with your characters. The only thing I don't think you can deviate from is having a healer of some sort, with Medic obviously being the only option in the first game. If you want to play the whole series, I would suggest starting with the first one because if you try to come back to it after the second, and especially after the third, you will find it quite frustrating. There's just a lot of tweaks to the speed of the battle system and functionality of the mapping system. If you don't care about playing all of them, you might as well start with 3, it's definitely more accessible. The fourth one is coming out fairly soon for the 3DS, too.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 17:44
|
|
|
ShadeofBlue posted:So, the other point I wanted to make is that the Medic becomes a physical powerhouse in the late game with the use of the right skills and equipment, so just like the Monk in 3 (and War Magus in 2), you don't ever have to have your healer sitting idly by. I'd start putting the Medic in the front line at around the midgame if you go that route. Oh, I know about the Medic being a physical powerhouse in 1 if you build it that way, but I basically made mine a pure support since I had fairly heavy damage (Protector which isn't so much, Axe Land that used swords once axes couldn't remotely keep pace, Fire/Ice Alch and a Survivalist that had the 3-round shot maxed or near maxed for boss fights and did pretty good damage in general) traveling along with the Medic so having it defend was no big deal to me. Even beat the main meat of the game. Haven't touched the post-game, but I imagine I will someday but I wanted to start EO2 when I finished so I jumped straight to that. EO2, on the other hand? I think I'm in the 2nd or 3rd stratum, I just need to go fight FOEs more than I do because I know my gear is what is hamstringing me to an extent, along with a short period of constantly swapping characters because of an unlockable class in 2 that I was curious about. 3's going pretty smoothly overall, and definitely seems to have the smoothest difficulty curve of the lot.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 17:54
|
|
|
EO2's maingame can be shattered with a Survivalist, as Chimera's conditional drop unlocks the best bow in the game and is easily farmed. You can have it by the seventh floor pretty easily if you're patient. EO3 is not really subject to this - but on the other hand, it's also much more flexible in terms of builds and you can pull of some snazzy stuff. For reference, I beat Progenitor (final boss, for the unspoiled/uninitiated) on my first time through the game at a party level of 46. Every FAQ, guide, and question I've seen about it had people saying "level 55 minimum, 60's much better". I really, really appreciate a game that lets me do that - I didn't break it in any way, but with clever tactics and skill usage I was able to pull off some awesome stuff.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 18:10
|
|
|
Doesn't that bow cost like 255-300k and the boss drops are only worth about 10k? It's a huge grind for sure, but I'm guilty of doing it myself in EO2.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 18:35
|
|
|
FrickenMoron posted:Doesn't that bow cost like 255-300k and the boss drops are only worth about 10k? It's a huge grind for sure, but I'm guilty of doing it myself in EO2. Once you beat the second stratum Hellion is even easier to farm, as Climax works on him and gives you his conditional drop. It is silly, and 
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 19:16
|
|
|
theshim posted:Around 260, I think. But the drop is worth a solid 30k each time. Grind a few levels on the sixth floor and you can do Chimera runs in two minutes. Half an hour tops for the bow, plus all the levels your party just got from the Chimera runs themselves (which is pretty solid for a while). Because I wanted all the super gear that costs in the 100000s that I could use, I ended up being so overleveled that the rest of the game, even most FOEs, were pathetic (up through the 5th stratum; I never did the 6th since you need to do a mapping quest that is pure bullshit). Though EO being what it is, there was still the occasional tough bit, something you can't say about overleveling in most RPGs.
|
|
#
?
Jul 10, 2012 23:55
|
|
|
Genocyber posted:Because I wanted all the super gear that costs in the 100000s that I could use, I ended up being so overleveled that the rest of the game, even most FOEs, were pathetic (up through the 5th stratum; I never did the 6th since you need to do a mapping quest that is pure bullshit). Though EO being what it is, there was still the occasional tough bit, something you can't say about overleveling in most RPGs. Yah, the final strata always have some bullshit in them. I guess the justification is that it's after the games "final" boss, and the game designers can throw whatever they want at the player. I still haven't gotten to floor 30 in EO 2. I really enjoyed every floor on the sixth stratum in EO 1, although I think I'm in the minority there. The whole series really thrives on atmosphere. The music and the art really go well together, and in the strata that are especially well done in terms of that, I feel like I can just disappear into them for a few hours, like the second stratum in EO 2, and the sixth in EO 3. And the fact that you kind of have to pay attention even in random encounters also makes for a really immersive game. Or at least it does for me  .
|
|
#
?
Jul 11, 2012 04:55
|
|
|
100percentjesusfree posted:
Ah, the mandrakes. They can be found in EO2, too. At first, they seem pretty harmless when you find them, especially for a monster in the 5th stratum. I started to ignore them after I found out that my hexer could just poison them and they seldom lasted longer then the first turn. Hours later I reached the end of the stratum and went back to town, saved and warped back into the 5th stratum for a quest or something. In the very first battle a mandrake used a certain skill. Total party kill. Tithin Melias posted:Whereas I found the ship travelling section extremely tedious that absolutely required a guide to make the exact right steps. That`s a question of personal taste, I guess. I didn't even thought about using a guide, since exploring was just so much fun. I think thanks to me, Armoroad must have lost more ships then the french armada at Trafalgar by now.  theshim posted:TP problems in EO2 were easily solved by one word: Cursecut. Amritas was what solved my troubles in the end, but using Cursecut never really worked for me. In the time it took me to curse a few poor fellows and harvest TP from them I could easily slaughter half a dozen enemy groups with poison. It may have been a bit shortsighted of me, but luckily I just retired my EO2 main party because they reached the level limit. Now I can shift a few more points to cursing and cursecutting people! (After lots of grinding of course. I just had to reestablish my poison-everyone build first, after all.)
|
|
#
?
Jul 11, 2012 21:39
|
|
|
Libluini posted:Amritas was what solved my troubles in the end, but using Cursecut never really worked for me. In the time it took me to curse a few poor fellows and harvest TP from them I could easily slaughter half a dozen enemy groups with poison. It may have been a bit shortsighted of me, but luckily I just retired my EO2 main party because they reached the level limit. Now I can shift a few more points to cursing and cursecutting people! (After lots of grinding of course. I just had to reestablish my poison-everyone build first, after all.) I never really bothered with Poison beyond Chimera grinding, since Torpor is easily the best Hexer ability. Though yeah, Amritas kind of make Cursecut less useful, though using it does mean less inventory space is taken up (I ran out of space all the time due to Scavenge).
|
|
#
?
Jul 11, 2012 21:52
|
|
|
This thread convinced me to dust off my EO2 and I just continued off from where I left off, partway through the second strata. It looks like I had some sense with my party makeup, so it was ok. Had a few issues with the Strata 2 boss, but after resting my front line he went down easy enough. I play the poo poo of the game today, and get to the 3 Strata boss. TPK in her first attack, after only two characters had turns. So back to the drawing board, I guess.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 07:42
|
|
|
Finally found a copy of this game and for some reason I find the cartography aspect oddly relaxing. The game is so gorgeous and vibrant compared to all the bleak poo poo I've been playing.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 09:10
|
|
|
Genocyber posted:I never really bothered with Poison beyond Chimera grinding, since Torpor is easily the best Hexer ability. That's a strange way to misspell "Revenge"
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 09:14
|
|
|
Marogareh posted:Finally found a copy of this game and for some reason I find the cartography aspect oddly relaxing. The game is so gorgeous and vibrant compared to all the bleak poo poo I've been playing. Yeah, definitely a strong point of the series. Most of the strata are very interesting, EO3 is the best in the series in that regard too.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 12:21
|
|
|
Orcs and Ostriches posted:This thread convinced me to dust off my EO2 and I just continued off from where I left off, partway through the second strata. It looks like I had some sense with my party makeup, so it was ok. Had a few issues with the Strata 2 boss, but after resting my front line he went down easy enough. Yeah, that one's a bitch. Depending on what classes you have, it can be really helpful to grind up each character's force bar prior to fighting the boss; just get into a battle with a weak enemy, and constantly defend for 10 to 15 minutes. FrickenMoron posted:Yeah, definitely a strong point of the series. Most of the strata are very interesting, EO3 is the best in the series in that regard too. So far I haven't been too impressed with EO3's. While I liked the 1st stratum a lot, the second is rather bland. Though in 2 the best strata for the last few, so I'm hoping it'll be the same in 3.
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 18:32
|
|
|
Yeah the second and fourth strata are the low points of EO3, the others are really great though!
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 18:47
|
|
|
I really enjoyed the music in the 4th stratum of EO3 myself(though the 3rd's is the one that always gets stuck in my head), so I didn't mind it much. That is the one point in the game where I had to grind in order to beat the boss though.
Sacrificial Toast fucked around with this message at 22:36 on Jul 12, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 22:34
|
|
|
Sacrificial Toast posted:I really enjoyed the music in the 4th stratum of EO3 myself(though the 3rd's is the one that always gets stuck in my head), so I didn't mind it much. That is the one point in the game where I had to grind in order to beat the boss though. I mean I liked a lot of the music from EO3 (hello there Hoist the Sword) but Chalky Woods was unquestionably the moment where I stopped and said "Whoa."
|
|
#
?
Jul 12, 2012 23:28
|
|
|
Sacrificial Toast posted:I really enjoyed the music in the 4th stratum of EO3 myself(though the 3rd's is the one that always gets stuck in my head), so I didn't mind it much. That is the one point in the game where I had to grind in order to beat the boss though. I probably ought to point out, to those who mind, that the names of the songs for each stratum might be considered spoilery, as they do tell you a little about the nature of each stratum. (Then again I don't know how spoilery people consider names and such aaaahhh I am bad at this)Also sorry again about the lack of updates, just not been sleeping too well lately so it's hard to focus on writing anything. I'll probably try to at least get a class breakdown done sometime soon, or a proper update, or something!
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2012 01:46
|
|
|
For someone like me who hasn't played through any of the three games yet, I don't risk clicking on any links to music to spoil myself on future areas. It'd be appreciative if people didn't write the song's title as the Url link name though.  Aww, I hope that you'll be able to sleep normally again, 100%jesusfree! Do a little at a time every day-ish for your updates. Don't try to do it all at once, it'll only make you more tired!
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2012 02:03
|
|
|
The only stratum, in any of the games, who's name is any kind of spoiler is EO1s final stratum, the rest of them are just basically pretty genericy area names.
|
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2012 02:41
|
|
|
Enjoying this game and LP.
Maxwellsdemon fucked around with this message at 13:21 on Jul 13, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jul 13, 2012 13:10
|
|
|
It's nice reading this LP and looking back at the strata it feels like I beat so long ago... I just beat EO1's final boss for the first time yesterday. Made me feel all  inside after throwing myself against it a few times and ragequitting for a little while. In true EO fashion first I ran out of Nectars, then the Medic died, then the Alchemist and Landsknecht, and I finally eked out a victory with only my Protector tossing Somas and Hamaos for my Dark Hunter keeping it gagged. Whew! Now for postgame!
|
|
#
?
Jul 17, 2012 01:36
|
|
|
Just beat the third game with nothing but physical attacks and aside from F.O.E's it wasn't that hard. It has nowhere near the amount of dick moves as other Atlus games and the teleporter section actually made sense instead of sending you to random places. I switched buccaneer to arbalist early on and she completely demolished everything even when her level was two times lower than everyone else in my party. Having an Arbalist with maxed out swashbuckling, bolt mastery, giant killer, attack order/charge tactic and lethal tactic is pretty drat brutal  . Best moment of the game for me was fighting nine F.O.E's one after the other since they zone in on you and actually winning.
Marogareh fucked around with this message at 15:00 on Jul 19, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jul 19, 2012 14:54
|
|
|
Update 9 - In which I remember I'm supposed to be doing an LP Yeah, sorry this took so long! Combination of poor sleep, Steam sale and a few other things left me without all that much time/inclination for it. Still, back now!  "You put that mandrake you took back on ice to study later? Didn't realise you could get enough of that around here." "Eh. Just got another Alchemist I know to do it for me." "You'll have to introduce us sometime... for now, let's get back to adventure. Feels like we've not gotten much done in forever." This skill is the main thing that makes these guys threatening, because it does...  This, across the whole party. A group of enemies with multiple mandrakes can quickly result in your armour being quickly made roughly as useful as paper, while the rest of the monsters tear into you. Fortunately, for now, we're doing really well for levels due to constantly killing FOEs, so they're not as much of a threat as they could be. "Augh! This armour's expenisve! Next time, warn me if something you've been studying can spew acid, Alvis!" "Ah, yeah. Watch out, everyone, they can spew acid."   "Great. Corroded armour, and another of those goddamn mantises right around the corner." "Actually, my armour's feeling fine again." "...What. Why would something evolve so it can spew acid that magically wears off after a few minutes?"  "Well-" "Nevermind." Closeup of an FOE that's actively chasing us... non-chasing ones stay yellow regardless of distance, whereas more hostile ones look like this. There's one other colour that we've not seen yet, too.  "Here we go again..." "Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more!" "Not to worry, I'll just poison it again." "Er." "Yeah, feel free to get on doing that anytime."  "Serves you right, smartass, now to..."  "Just poison the drat thing!"Such is the downside of having someone spamming poison, you're putting your fate into the hands of the RNG to some degree, which is never really ideal. However, to put into context just how good poison damage is against FOEs at this point... Alvis' thunder attack hits Stalkers for ~25. Our physical attackers hit for between 1 and 5 damage. Poison hits for 243 damage a round. It's the only thing that causes anything that even resembles significant damage at this point, and is the only reason we have a hope in hell against this kind of thing.  "Jeez, finally. I don't even care how it feels this time, just hurry up and die." "Agh! Still not dying fast enough for my tastes."I think this was a hit of Scythe, through Hector's defense. It no longer quite one-shots him, so yay. Incidentally, the main differences between Scythe and Attack seem to be that Scythe is much slower, giving the party time to act before it hits, but hits a lot harder.  "Peace, my heart, let the time for the parting be sweet.Let it not be a death but completeness. Let love melt into memory and pain into songs. Let the flight through the sky end in the folding of the wings over the nest. Let the last touch of your hands be gentle like the flower of the night. Stand still, O Beautiful End, for a moment, and say your last words in silence. I bow to you and hold up my lamp to light you on your way. ~Rabindranath Tagore "  "FINALLY. I'd offer you a high five for that, but yeah, scythe-hands." "That's kind of mean..." "So is spewing more crap with your dying breath than you normally say on an entire trip."The round ended, and the stalker died of poisoning. I can't shake the mental image of it dying while just listening to those two bicker, which amuses me greatly.  "Hm... I get the feeling I just picked up an important skill."I'm not normally going to do this, but I just want to talk about immunize for a sec. This skill is completely, absurdly good, and is one of the (many) things that make medics as fantastic as they are in this game. The description makes it sound fairly decent, though not a lot of enemies use 'elemental' attacks like fire, lightning etc. this early in the game... however, even physical attacks are treated as having an element, such as cut/bash/whatever, and this boosts against those, too. At level 1, this provides 30% resistance, and gives something like a flat +5% with each level of the skill taken. It is completely, absurdly good, even if its TP cost is rather pricey. I also just love the thought of a medic immunizing people, via injections or something, against lightning and stabbing. Long story short, FOE killing just got much more survivable. "That's great, but unless it involves reviving these guys, we'd better get back to town." "Huh, we did this? Alright, then."This quest is basically to go to that resting spot on the first floor and kill the venomflies there. The one that I'm pretty sure you have to go to during the 'map out the first floor' bit of the game, and which you have no way of knowing is going to spawn horrible monsters. If you've already cleared that point out, this quest seems to be automatically completed. I THINK you're supposed to get a slightly better reward if you only clear the spot out after taking the quest on, but I got a Theriaca A (removes bindings) and a Medica (cheap healing item), which isn't all that terrible for doing no work. "Hey, no sense in complaining about it. Now, let's get back to the labyrinth!" "What now?"One has black robes and flame hair, while the other bears a fierce look and a katana.  "Who's there!?"The adventurers appear to be veterans, and have made no move to lower their defenses. Perhaps they'll relent if you tell them that you are also adventurers from Etria. "Well we're not bloody botanists, that's for certain. Except- nevermind. We're adventurers, how else would we get here?" "Ah, Etrian explorers. Didn't the Radha notify you?" "Let me guess, more red tape?" "We have orders from the Radha to guard this place, I am Ren, a ronin, and she is Tlachtga, a hexer."The two classes we don't have, yet! Incidentally, two of the classes I've not used much. Still, I'll try to show them off for this LP when we can pick them up. "Return to town at once and get the details from Radha Hall."Ren barks these cold, sharp words, then lapses into a silent glare.  "Do the Radha have something against people getting things done?!"Not gonna lie, this is one thing that always annoys me in these games. I think there's an example in all three of them, where you get to a point in the labyrinth, and someone just sits there and won't let you pass 'til you go back to town. It basically boils down to reach a certain point, go back to town, talk to a dude, go back there... it's like a fetch quest, where the only thing to fetch is a mission back at town. Maybe it's just me, but I always found forced backtracking annoying, and you do plenty of non-forced backtracking every time you need to heal at the inn/revive the dead. "Ugh. There was a ragelope back on the previous floor, right? Let's go kill that, I could do with letting off some steam." "God... drat..." "BUERACRACCCCYYYY"  So, let's talk a bit about boost. Boost is never really explained that well in game, and it seems to raise whenever your character gets hit, or hits something, as well as having items to increase it, but it's reset to 0 when it's used, or when you return to town. It only really gets much use on long expeditions, but using the Boost command doesn't take up a turn. It essentially makes whatever action you take next more effective - attacking will deal more damage, skills used are treated as if they were 5 levels higher than they are - which does indeed mean that maxed out skills are treated as being level 15. It's not exactly a vital game mechanic, but it can be nice. The third game improved on this vastly, as it did with most things. The results here were actually embarrassingly unimpressive this early on. We did kill the ragelope without issue, but that's kind of a given at this point. "That... feels much better. Let's go talk to the Radha now I've gotten that out of my system."  "I'm sorry, but I'll have to ask that you postphone furhter investigation for now. It appears there are dangerous beasts prowling the lower reaches of the grove." "And that's different from other floors because...?" "We're considering issuing a mission to exterminate these troublesome wolves. Until the lower floors are confirmed as safe, abandon all further exploration."A new mission is available. Select "Accept missions" from the menu to see the details.  "You may wish to block off our pathbut if we're to spare you our wrath you shall let us go forth past the third, to the fourth we've survived this long, do the math." "Rhyming a word with itself is cheating." "I think a different spelling means it counts?" "Don't encourage him." "You accept, then?" "Yes, well done working that one out." "Very good. Now then, let me give you the details. Beyond the 3rd floor, there have been many sightings of forest wolves. This in itself poses little danger... but they seem to be organized by a leader." "Given the giant mantis things we've been fighting, I find it hard to believe anything we face is gonna be a danger now." "That leader is Fenrir, their alpha wolf, and he awaits explorers on the 5th floor. Our own warriors are capable of defeating them, of course. I believe you've met them. But we can't overrely on REn and Tlachtga, or newcomers will have no chances to grow." "So instead, you station them to guard a door, and not let newcomers through until they talk to you? And you then do your best to discourage them, all so that they can grow?" "Yes. Do you wish to submit a complaint about it?" "Not if I want to get anything done this week, I bet." "Very good. Their current orders are to provide support to the young explorers. We ask that you use their help in defeating Fenrir." "Sure. We'll have them block off a door for us or something. Now, back into the labyrinth." "...What the hell is that thing meant to be?!"Rollers (the new enemy seen here) are kind of a pain. They hit reasonably hard, and can raise their physical defense over and over again, 'til fighters can't scratch them. Magic is the way to go, really. They drop gum hides, however, which are used in a whole bunch of stuff, so fighting them isn't all bad.  "I see you've been to the radha and accepted that mission. Then we're no longer needed here. I bid you good luck."The women stand aside, as the severe ronin offers a final word of advice. "The wolves are resilient enemies. We'll help you as best we can, but be careful."Considering this, you gaze into the forest, and wonder if you shouldn't stock up in town. "No we don't! We've been forced back there enough times already." "...Not sure who he's talking to, but I don't think I care enough to ask." It's in groups like this that mandrakes start getting more dangerous - a big hit to your defense, with multiple other things all hitting you, can be quite troublesome.  "Oh boy, this can only go well."You can't see it, but there's a door past those two FOEs. Getting to it without getting attacked is probably not entirely impossible, but you need to have a stalker's movement pattern down perfectly to know when to move between them.  But where's the fun in that?  ":gib- wait, nevermind. I'm fine. Ish"This is the result of Scythe, through Immunize and Front Guard, both reducing its damage, and it STILL nearly one-shots Dietrich. You're really not meant to take on Stalkers at this point.  We got poison to stick on the first round, though, so that, plus Dietrich surviving a Scythe attack, meant that we won with only one casualty. New record!  I'm just getting cocky at this point, I think.  But seriously, look at this. Jill, our squishy healer, can survive a hit from it with immunize on, and Poison (now at rank 9) deals 255 damage per round. The Etrian Odyssey wiki advises you to avoid these things at all costs, but they're not really that much of a threat, now, unless we get particularly unlucky with poison not sticking. Also, it probably goes without saying, but don't look at the EO wiki if you care about spoilers. This stalker, too, goes down with only a single casualty   "Augh. Whatever was past those things had better be worth it."A Medica III (large healing item), Hide Boot and 400en. Not fantastic loot for killing two stalkers, honestly, though the hide boot we can't buy yet, and gives +2 agility, so it's not too bad. "Not... terrible, I guess."Annoyingly, past that, there's not really a lot to talk about on this floor for a little while - an easy FOE encounter with a Kuyutha, which you can avoid easily enough, and just a bunch of wandering around trying to find the way to go. We'll be back here later for something more interesting, but right now, there was a fair bit of wandering-around time which left me with nothing to really say.  Smiling as if to congratulate you on your steady progress, the warrior woman greets you. "It seems there are no wolves on this floor yet, I'll give you some advice, before you go back on your way through the forest. The trees are not always as impassable as they look." "They are if you're stood in front of them." "Finding the hidden paths will allow you to move about more efficiently. Keep an eye out." "We've actually already found one! Thanks for the tip, though!" "Don't tell her that, she'll go blockade that one, too." "There's a hidden path around here, in fact, see if you can spot it." "Well, that was easy enough. Let's call it a day, for now, I think." "I swear, if we run into any more red tape on this adventure, I'm going to go nuts." "Wonder what wolf meat tastes like? Should go well with a good beer." "Now I can heal people, or just make them not need healing in the first place!" "If it bleeds, I can kill it. By making it bleed poison." "Ability will never catch up with the demand for it."New Shop Stuff! We got a whole bunch of stuff this update. And most of it kind of sucks. Ah well, let's go through it anyway! The Buffcoat we already found in a chest a bit back - it's not bad, and gives a very nice agility boost, but most of the time, it's better to have more defense, unless it's very important a character goes first. It requires a Vine (drops from Mandrakes, and I think there's a gathering point where you can find them?), 1 Gum Hide, which drops from Rollers and a creature we're yet to see, and a hare tail.  The hide vest is just not very good. It's strictly worse than the doublet, and it's possible to get the doublet first. It only takes a single Gum Hide to make, but it's still kind of 'eh'.  Similarly, the Hide Hat is kind of redundant. It has exactly the same stats as the red charm, and it tkaes up your head slot instead of a slot that you can have an unlimited amount of things in. It's slightly cheaper than the red charm, I guess? Requires a Gum Hide and 3 Soft Hide.  The petal ring is pretty good for magic users, but early on, I tend to prefer the red charm for +TP over the Tec bonus. Later, when TP is less of an issue, that might change. It requires ten tiny petals, which drop from woodflies and venomflies.  I'm in two minds about this - on the one hand, equipping it will reduce the Tec of those who have a Staff equipped... but on the other, it would give them more survivability, and a bit of a boost to their usefulness without using TP. It requires 15 beast bones, and 1 large fang.  Not much to say about this - it's a consumable healing item, that heals a lot more than the basic medica. Requires ten tiny petals to make.  The leaf coat! It can be equipped by a few very specific classes, which already have much better armour. It's terrible! Requires 5 vines and a tiny petal.  Hide gloves are decent, at least - for those who need more strength than defense, a little boost is always nice. Dietrich has a pair, now. They're made from 3 Gum Hides and 7 Soft Hides. 100percentjesusfree fucked around with this message at 15:31 on Aug 1, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2012 03:48
|
|
|
Aw man!! I was beginning to miss this LP for its snarky and wonderful characterization.  I love this game and this LP so much. It's great that FOE's don't pose too much of a lethal threat anymore and that more than 1 member are able to survive the onslaught.I've been working on and off on two fanarts for this LP. I hope I can finish them soon enough (like... before this LP ends, realistically.)  
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2012 14:48
|
|
|
Hooray, it's back! Just out of morbid curiosity: are you planning on retiring as soon as you hit 30? I just did it in my EO3 playthrough and I'd forgotten how much of a slog getting back up can be. Also those are crazy pretty, HelloWinter. Real nice.
|
|
#
?
Jul 23, 2012 15:41
|
|
|
theshim posted:Hooray, it's back! Do you mean resting, or actually retiring? I never used retiring much, and I'd rather not do that seeing as it pretty much costs you the character. I might rest Alvis, to make him more thunder oriented instead of ALL POISON ALL THE TIME, but beyond that, I'm not sure. Also, those are beautiful, Hellowinter, thank you so much! Mind if I put those in the second post and start a fanart section in it?
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 00:29
|
|
|
100percentjesusfree posted:Also, those are beautiful, Hellowinter, thank you so much! Mind if I put those in the second post and start a fanart section in it?  I was meant to have them finished weeks ago but stuff came up. I'll draw up and post the finished illustrations eventually...!
HelloWinter fucked around with this message at 00:46 on Jul 24, 2012 |
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 00:44
|
|
|
100percentjesusfree posted:
...The dragons from Bubble Bobble?
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 03:06
|
|
|
Glad to see this back. Your LP convinced me to go back to the second game (seeing as I don't own the this one), after my last attempt burned out around floor 3. The stuff I learned from your LP helped a lot. Especially the bit about using Survivalists to generate funds. Comparing the two, it's fun to see how Atlus kept track of the popular methods for flattening the game's difficulty curve... And went out of their way to remove that stuff. Alchemists don't get poison, FOEs don't give EXP, gathering points have a chance of generating a supremely nasty ambush, no Immunize skill... Oh Atlus. Is there any company more spiteful to its customers than you?
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 06:13
|
|
|
Good stuff, 100percent. I love how frustrated everyone is about the red tape. I would be too! I think that's a fault of the game's general design--the only places they can really send you are the dungeon and the town, so if they want to quest variety they are fundamentally limited. Which makes me think: Were there parts of EO3 where you'd be in the dungeon and they'd tell you to go to one of the places on the ocean map? I don't remember any.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 13:54
|
|
|
Rangpur posted:Comparing the two, it's fun to see how Atlus kept track of the popular methods for flattening the game's difficulty curve... And went out of their way to remove that stuff. Alchemists don't get poison, FOEs don't give EXP, gathering points have a chance of generating a supremely nasty ambush, no Immunize skill... Oh Atlus. Is there any company more spiteful to its customers than you? Immunize had to go though. It was ridiculous. FOEs give XP again in EO3 (which I'm tremendously grateful for). I hope they do again in EO4. It makes ramming them as soon as you hit them even more fantastic  Lotish posted:Good stuff, 100percent. I love how frustrated everyone is about the red tape. I would be too! I think that's a fault of the game's general design--the only places they can really send you are the dungeon and the town, so if they want to quest variety they are fundamentally limited. Which makes me think: Were there parts of EO3 where you'd be in the dungeon and they'd tell you to go to one of the places on the ocean map? I don't remember any.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 15:25
|
|
|
theshim posted:Hexers get poison now though. And Alchemists aren't very good in EO2; Gunners are better for elemental damage and Hexers can poison and other stuff too. Maybe for the postgame content.
|
|
#
?
Jul 24, 2012 22:46
|
|
|
If I remember correctly, when you retire a character the replacement gets an extra skill point for every 10 levels the original had.
|
|
#
?
Jul 25, 2012 15:23
|
|
|
The Hide Hat image in the latest update shows the Petal Ring image instead.
|
|
#
?
Jul 30, 2012 12:38
|
|
|
Thanks, fixed it now. Anyway, sorry again for lack of updates - I'm going to try and avoid filling the thread with excuses, just been feeling fairly terrible lately. I DO have screenshots for the next update all ready, I just need to get around to writing it up.
|
|
#
?
Aug 1, 2012 15:32
|
|
|
Looking forward to it!
|
|
#
?
Aug 1, 2012 18:20
|
|
|
There's a long journey downward ahead of us, you can't stop now already soldier!
|
|
#
?
Aug 1, 2012 18:27
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 20, 2024 05:20 |
|
|
Update 10 - Progress! Sorry again for these updates taking much longer than the earlier ones - I've got no intention of abandoning this LP, but some real-life stuff has been slowing me down more than I'd like. I'm not gonna be putting it on hiatus or anything, but I'm probably not going to be updating quite as fast as I used to. Or I might suddenly find myself with LOADS OF TIME and fire off a million updates, who knows. In any case, sorry again for taking so long! "Right. With that secret passage we found last time, we ought to be able to get deeper into the third floor much quicker. Let's get back to it!"Unfortunately, there's actually not a lot on floor 3 to talk about. No TP recovering fruit or boots that look like animals, and we already slaughtered most of the FOEs. Still, there're a few things, at least! On the other hand, lack of stuff to comment on gave me all the more reason to cover a bunch more ground than usual, so hey, not all bad.  "Ooh! There are lots of plants around here... we ought to note this place down, some of them might be good for medicine and stuff!" "Might be?" "I'm a medic, not a herbalist! You can't just mash random plants together and have medicine come out, we'd need someone who knows what they're doing with this stuff."The second of three types of resource-gathering points, Take points generally have plant-ish things, like flowers and such, which would make a reasonable amount of sense to be able to just take. Unfortunately, this is much more of a pain to farm than the one on the first floor, as it's much further away, and we'd need survivalists who can get down this far and not get murdered. "Bah, mashing random things together is the basis of all science, let me just-" "No. Let's move on before you find a way to make plants spew lightning at us."   "Without warning, an ear-piercing scream sounds out, followed by the growl of a fierce beast. Mere yards away, a giant wolf is preparing to spring onto an unlucky soldier! The wuonded soldier seems to be etrified with horror. You take a step forward..."  The game isn't kidding, it really does just move you a step forwards. I thought it was a nice little detail.  "Do you have to ask? Charge!" As far as I know, your decision here doesn't really make a difference. I don't think I've ever chosen 'No', though. Searching for its source, you find the hexer Tlachtga standing quietly there. Her lips scarcely parting, the girl with the ringing bell murmurs a mysterious chant. All at once, the wolf that had stod ready to pounce stops moving, its muscles tensed... At a final word from the girl, blood spews from the wolf's jaws, and it collapses.  "They don't hear or see well, but they can smell blood."Fixing her pale-eyed gaze upon you, the girl approaches. "You should be careful. It's dangerous to fight wolves with open wounds like his."Hand outstretched, Tlachtga sprinkles some droplets of shining water on you. Your HP and TP were recovered!  "I'll tend to this soldier. You should go on... The stairs to the 4th floor are not far."As she speaks, Tlachtga points you to the back of the room. "I'll stay here until you defeat Fenrir. Come back if your wounds become too severe." "Thou that has given so much to me,Give one thing more- a grateful heart; Not thankful when it pleaseth me, As if thy blessings had spare days; But such a heart, whose pulse may be Thy praise." "...what?" "I think he's saying thanks!" "For once, I agree with him then. Thanks."Tlachtga turns away, her attention focused on treating the collapsed soldier's wounds. The way is clear to continue forth. This is fantastic, frankly. Not only is it a free full heal now, but right up 'til Fenrir's defeated, Tlachtga stays here, and you can walk up to her as many times as you like for free full heals. I don't think she revives the dead, but still, it makes grinding much easier, if you still need to do some, and also makes prolonged exploration infinitely easier. Tlachtga may have a ridiculous name, but she's pretty cool in my book. "Tempting as it is to move on, we probably ought to fully explore this floor first. Never know what we might miss."In the room to the left of Tlachtga's magical healing chamber, there's a box with a Theriaca A. I figure people have enough of an idea what the treasure boxes look like now to not depict every single one, unless it's something significant!  "A box without hinges, key, or lid, yet golden treasure inside is hid." "Pretty sure this box has a lid, champ." "Um. Anyone else feel like there's something behind us?" "Well, gently caress. When the hell did that get there?"It's a bit of a sneaky move by the game, this - this FOE doesn't appear 'til you've gone past it, and there's no real way of avoiding it save for warp-wiring out. The box's contents? 500 en. Not exactly a fantastic prize. Not too terrible if you're short on cash, though.  "Oh, it's just a ragelope. This shouldn't take long." For some idea of how far the party's coming along, this is what we do to one of these things in one round, now, mostly thanks to poison damage still being completely absurd at this point.  "Anyway, we're about done here, so let's finally move on to the next fl-" "...Anyone else hear a clunk?" "I think that was the sound of night falling." "Huh. First thing I've heard you say that wasn't a quote or somet-" "Puns are a completely valid literary technique."  "That wasn't, though."  Just figured I'd show off the transition between day and night - between those last two pics, the party took one step. Soon as the clock hits six, it goes from all bright to really dark. If anyone's interested, I can have another shot at making gifs to catch one of it, I just seem to have trouble optimising them well  "I get the weird feeling we're missing something on this floor, somewhere... ah well." Much like the third floor, we're given a lovely little warning message not long into our expedition here.  Their wild cries echo through the trees... You suddenly recall Tlachtga's words. She warned you that this is a dreadful place where feral wolves dwell. You continue forth, the threat of approaching wolves uppermost in your mind..." As you can guess from this message, FOEs are everywhere on this floor, and a new kind, too. You have to be pretty careful if you want to avoid them all.   "Weird looking wolf. Well, let's get this over with." "This enemy looksLike it might be a huge pain Hit that thing harder." Right now, this is Keyser's main use due to the way I'm building him - giving the party a bit of a strength buff. Soon he'll go from being terrible to very, very useful though.  "I'm hitting it pretty drat hard, thanks." "Huh. That was anticlimactic."Aaaand yeah. While there are a lot of these things on this floor, they honestly barely pose a threat. I mean, they hit fairly hard, I'll give them that, but aside from one little thing, they don't really have a lot of tricks up their sleeves. Hell, they're easier than Ragelopes, really. If you have a party that has been downing FOEs with some regularity, these things are a cakewalk, turning this floor from a game of carefully-planned avoidance to one of wolf extermination for fun and profit.  Sadly, the exp they give out isn't exactly fantastic. Still not bad, though.  I mentioned them having one other trick up their sleeve, and this is just that - when in battle with one, every other wolf on the floor becomes hostile and starts tracking you. I think Tlatchga's words earlier were a hint to this... but given that our strategy with FOEs so far is slaughter them ridiculously fast, it doesn't really make much difference to us  "Bah, we could keep going, but our pack's full to bursting... it would be a shame to find something interesting and have no room for it."Ahh, the item limit. Bane of long expeditions. If you've got 60 or more items, you just can't pick up any more loot - it's pretty annoying! Still, gives us an excuse to do some stuff in town. Turned out we'd got hte materials to finish up one of our quests, so...   "I left y'reward wit' Valerie, so don' forget t'pick it up. If I t'ink up somet'in else, I'll make anot'er request. I owe y'one!"  Hurrah, a free weapon I'll never use! I sold it immediately. Only Landsknechts can use axes, and Dietrich's going for a more sword-focused build.  "Welcome back, Kids. Shilleka came by, bubbling about the equipment she was able to make. Sounded like you've got another satisfied customer. Keep up the good work, okay?" It does, however, open up the next quest in the chain of quests for her, which is good. Keyser could really use a bow that isn't complete shite. "Decided to take the request, have you? Good, I've been hoping someone would. Go to Shilleka's Goods to ask her which materials she needs. She was really pleased with that Hand Axe, you know. Good luck to you."Almost makes me feel bad just selling it right back to her.  Also, this quest was opened by going to floor 4, I think, and is absurdly easy. Step 1, make an alchemist. Step 2, make sure they know fire. Turn it in. No wonder the reward is kind of crap. "Bah. This could take a while, seeing as you're too busy chucking lightning and poison to learn how to set things on fire." "Not to worry! I told you, I know a guy who specializes in other stuff, I'll just get him to turn it in for us." "Alright. Whatever, let's take this one too, then." "Decided to take the request, have you? Good, I've been hoping someone would." She seems to say this before every single quest. I'm probably not going to include it from now on. Not that most of the quest dialogue is THAT interesting, honestly. Still, I'd feel bad just skipping it entirely, unless people don't care. "This is a request from Jackson Restaurant, but... Well, it's a strange one. He's requesting a person, not a thing. He wants an alchemist who knows the Fire formula. What could he possibly need that for...? Anyway, come back with that alchemist, okay?" "Bah, he should try cooking with lightning! I bet the taste would be sho-" "If you finish that thought, you're going to spend the rest of your life with no teeth." "Lessee here, t'materials I need are... two Horns, and five Gum Hides. It's a good weapon for t'Survivalists! Gat'er materials quick for me, okay?"Anyway, between pics, we  The message we get for having an alchemist with the appropriate skill in the party... also, a nice shot of the town at night! "Ah, you learned the Fire formula. Congrats. I'll contact Mr. Jackson. I bet he'll have more work for you, too. But I still can't figure out what a restaurateur would need with the Fire formula..." "He needed some fire, genius. Some of the things he normally used to cook food with had broken down, and like the rest of you peasants he turned to the arcane arts for help." "Hm. We'll have to give this guy a shot coming down with us sometime. Anyway, back down into the labyrinth for now." Huzzah, the last type of gathering point - mining. These quite often have metal ores and such, and the stuff you get from them is fairly often used in heavy armours/weapons, I think.  Treausre! There are actually a few boxes here and there on the floor, though none have anything all that interesting liket he ambush on the previous floor. This one contains a Bravant, a 'bitter candy that temporarily raises attack'. The kind of thing that takes up inventory space, and I tend to forget exists. Some ways off to the northwest, there's a chest containing a plate, and to the northeast, a chest with a medica II. Not exactly fantastic loot, but free stuff is free stuff. Honestly, if you grind a bit to make sure you have materials for items, chest rewards are often a little underwhelming, throughout this stratum at least. I can't really recall if that changes much later.  "Oh fantastic. More crabs."New random battle enemy! Similar to clawbugs except they're red! I forgot to get a shot showing their names, because I'm an idiot. They're basically a straight upgrade of Clawbugs. High defense, weak to elemental attacks, a waste of TP to deal with, the only difference being that they're tougher and hit harder.  Like the previous floor, floor 4 doesn't have all that much to talk about, and if you can just plow through wolves, it's really short. We've not QUITE fully explored it, but near enough already. Through that door below us is just another chest witha n Amrita. "Hm... not all that much left to do here. Let's head back. We've gotten a lot done."No sheet updates this time, I think - not much has really changed. (Also, I completely forgot to get screenshots. )If anyone really wants to see, though, I can quickly grab some and toss them in here. Also, on our way back to the shop, after selling our stuff...  "My shop's selling more goods t'an ever, t'anks t'you. I owe you guys a lot. I left y'reward wit' Valerie at t'pub, so don't forget t'pick it up."And I, in a fit of idiocy, go and buy a shortbow for Keyser, only to realise that that's exactly the reward I'm going to get for the quest. I am the master of videogames, clearly.  "You're doing a great job so far with the requests. Keep it up!"Actually, I have a quick question for everyone, and I'm posting it here at the end of the update, but before the shop stuff, in case people skip over the shop bit. Would anyone mind if I use Serasmus for a while, instead of Alvis? He'll need some training up, but we're coming up to a boss which, like most bosses, is very difficult to hit with a status effect, so our usual tactic won't work, and having someone who can lob high-level fire spells around would make the sailing much smoother. I am, however, playing an Atlus game, proving I'm something of a masochist, so if you'd prefer to see me suffer, I can just keep the party as-is, and bash my head against him until I get lucky But yeah, if you have an opinion on which you'd prefer, put in a bolded vote in your post, please. New shop stuff!  The hand axe! Five Hardwood, five Hard Shells, and a quest objective. You'll get one free for finishing the quest, so you'll probably never buy one even if you're using an axe-necht. If you're using two axenechts, then you might, but I have no idea why anyone would do that. (Not that axenechts are terrible or anything, it'd just be weird and redundant.)  The Aspis is pretty good. 10 Hardwoods, 5 Hard Shells, and a nice boost to Def and Vit. Boosting Vit also boosts Defense, so it's basically just a straight upgrade to the previous shield, at a not-much-greater price.  The Short Bow provides a much-needed bow upgrade, finally giving us one with an attack that isn't complete arse. If you have survivalists or troubadours in your team, this will be very handy. As Shilleka told us earlier, it needs 2 horns and 5 gum hides to make. The price isn't too bad, but you get one free at the end of the quest. If you're like me, you'll buy it anyway, then realise what you've done a few moments too late. Still, it's not like it's that expensive.  Like most weapon upgrades, the Bullwhip is just a nice boost to attack over previous whips. It's great if you have Dark Hunters, and useless if you don't. It requires 5 Gum Hides, and 5 Vines.  Not a new shop item, just the inevitable fate of the Bravant. Who wants bitter candy, anyway? I really should do this more often, it felt good to actually get on with this and write. As usual, please let me know if I've cocked something up, or the post sucks in general!
100percentjesusfree fucked around with this message at 00:45 on Aug 9, 2012 |
|
#
?
Aug 9, 2012 00:13
|
|