Casual Crafting Run

[bkdubs123]

Since the ONLY Crafting run is mostly just brokenly difficult and becoming unfun to continue, I decided to start a new, more casual game in the same spirit, but with fewer restrictions.

The rules:

1. No shopping except through Familiar or for Key Items. This allows access to Blue/Blackberries, herbs, hammers, and, of course, Thief's Glove and the Magical Rasp.

2. All guild missions are allowed, but only challenge missions without item rewards can be redeemed.

3. No treasure chests from the world map or from towns, but dungeon chests are free game.

4. I can use and equip all enemy drops without restriction.

5. Unique spots are very cool, very legal.

Any other thoughts, suggestions, or rules I should add but am forgetting?

[Second Duke Revier]

IMO a "live off the land" style playthrough would be interesting, one where you never touch item or equipment shops but still use stuff dropped from the enemies, found in chests, delivered via guild and challenge quests, or found via Survival. Given what I've seen, such a playthrough should be more than viable, and should provide a fair amount of challenge without going overboard.

I think the problem with your last challenge run was that you cut off too many sources of supply, and had to rely on unreliable resources. And you can't really play an RPG without resources. 😉

[Powersword]

I think there’s plenty of Skyrim style crafting ops in this. Minerals from mines, food from enemies, fishing, plants..
I think food is something really undervalued by the game itself in that you don’t really need to use it at all yet it can have great effects. It would have been nice if food had a more dramatic effect on the characters ie bonus health bars etc. might also have been nice for characters to actually dislike / like foods more and have unique effects. (Apart from super food which is unnecessarily difficult and unsatisfying)

[bkdubs123]

Even having bumped the difficulty up to Universe, we're crushing the enemies, even on Energy Nede. It's amazing what some defense and damage can do for a run 😅

I've got a whole lineup of endgame gear and I've only just started the Field of Wisdom (which I always tackle first).

We're level 50 and borderline too strong.

BUT, importantly, I am certainly having fun.

[Second Duke Revier]

I am glad to hear that. 🙂 While I do find the game a bit easy at its base, I can't deny that it still has its fair share of challenges, and still makes you think a bunch, you can't just bluntly rush through it, not without serious grinding.

[bkdubs123]

Though I've beaten every boss first try, there certainly were still a few tough ones that I pumped a fist and exclaimed, "yes!" over. Cynne (99999 dmg Fohn Wind edition) being one, for example.

There's still the odd encounter I end up retrying and retreating from, but for the most part, our Crafting is done. With an eclectic party of Ashton as leader and Precis, Welch, and Chisato as support, Reflective Plate on everyone, Gemini, SDUGA Punch, and the Gigawatt Stunner (750 ATK, +2 hits, and 80 CRT), everybody has great damage, defense, and elemental defenses to boot. I think Ashton has like 620 defense? Everyone else is around 500. We're a far cry from the ragtag crew who took on the Field of Courage 😅

I'm considering how I could make it more challenging without being just excruciating--you know how razor thin the balance of this game can be. I figure the first things to cut would be pickpocketing, the Rasp, and unique spots. But iron, hammers, herbs, and blue/blackberries would still be plentiful due to the access to Familiar. You'd be a bit undergeared this way, struggling more for armor and accessories, but surely still a capable crew based on my experience.

[bkdubs123]

Taking down Might, then Wisdom, then Courage, then Love this was a fun deviation from my norm. The Field of Might gave me a surprise--the jump in enemy HP there was quite staggering, and the guardian took me down on the first attempt! That last phase deals extremely high damage on Universe that my party just was not prepared for, great gear notwithstanding!

Wisdom and Courage passed without any real need for comment. Love went quick but Lavarre crushed us the first time so thoroughly I had to check my gear! The first attempt saw Claude and Welch (I switched the teams up) get nuked by Star Light, and getting killed immediately. Rena and Celine scrambled, but ultimately went down quickly thereafter. Wait. Doesn't my entire team Absorb Light? Yep. They sure do... So either Lavarre ignores defenses or she just has a lot of attacks that look like they're Light element, but actually aren't. I'll have to check out the fight mechanics on Galaxy to see what the differences are, if any. Strange.

Anyway, on my second attempt I told the crew to focus their attacks, I used an Ointment of Veda for the first time in my life 😅, and I took the fight directly to Lavarre. I had Rena straight up punch her in her stupid face while I waited a couple seconds for Assault Ashton to charge up his Dragon Breath, and from there the fight went pretty smoothly. At an average level of roughly 68, we've taken down all four Fields and we're ready to learn the secrets of the quite literally unbelievably ancient 🤔 Symbological Weapons Laboratory.

I've got two whole competent squads this time around, something I've never bothered with.

A-Team consists of Ashton, Dias, Precis, and Chisato.

B-Team led by Rena is supported by Claude, Welch, and Celine!

But before we head to Armlock, we're going into the belly of the beast to confront the Ten Wise Men. We're ready, right? Guys?

[Second Duke Revier]

Lavarre's attacks aren't Light element, they are completely non elemental. It's easy to think otherwise because of their appearance and her accompanying Sunbreakers, but they really aren't. And yeah, Ointments of Veda are amazing, although with Rena around you usually don't need them, Haste replicates their function. Though, both of them do stack, if you need to seriously outspeed something...

[bkdubs123]

Ugh.

First brick wall of the run, and I'm honestly surprised. I don't remember having this kind of trouble.

Metatron is handing us our asses. I decided to abandon defense, to boost AVD as high as can. We're over 200 on everyone, sometimes 250 or even 300+, but he hits every. single. time. 😳

Might try to reduce his accuracy.

Or.

I might just solo him with Claude, because he has no answer to Helmetbreak (I honestly can't think of any boss that does). 😅

[bkdubs123]

Damn.

I really don't feel like trying him again today.

This is a casual run. I might just bump him down to Galaxy. They didn't patch the game to make it more difficult did they? 😅

He's either immune to HIT DOWN or I simply couldn't connect with it. Deep Mist casts fast, and I tried it at least five times to no success.

He was knocking Claude out of the air during Helmetbreak, which I've never seen.

I got him to 20%, but I couldn't keep him broken. I think I got him to Break twice. One more and we could've had him, but for whatever reason he just kept killing Dias in one hit. He's got 6k HP and over 500 defense, but I couldn't keep Dias in the game to supplement the Southern Crosses and Helmetbreaks with his Pale Moonlight (which, it might just be bad luck, but it doesn't seem to teleport him behind the enemy when he's attacked nearly as often as it did before).

This is reminding me of my first attempts against the Raid bosses on Universe, and I was WAY higher level and used Maze of Tribulations gear for those 😅

Ugh.

Rough.

[Second Duke Revier]

I, uhhh, don't remember ever trying to use evasion strategies against Metatron. I assume you are trying to stack as much evade as you can via shields, accessories and battle formations, right?

[bkdubs123]

İlk olarak Second Duke of Aeria Revier tarafından gönderildi:

I, uhhh, don't remember ever trying to use evasion strategies against Metatron. I assume you are trying to stack as much evade as you can via shields, accessories and battle formations, right?

Yeah, I don't recall ever having this kind of trouble against Metatron. Idk if my head's just not in the game today or what, but no matter what I do, he smashes us. I'm even telling everyone to run and evade when he puts his invincibility up (and they just stand there until he hits them, then, if they're alive, they move). I've never had to think about this fight before 🤣

It's not like we have bad gear either. For example, Dias is rocking the Crimson Devil+ w/+10% CRT, Reflecting Plate+ w/+10% AVD, a Mithril Shield+ w/+10% DEF, a Helmet of Odin+ w/Red Dragon, Neo Greaves+ w/Blue Dragon, a Light Cross+ w/+10% max HP, and a Berserker Ring+ w/Break Up. Everyone's got a set up just as good! 😳

Idk, maybe I'm just underleveled? I even did a little grinding and we're around Lv 74 on average now, and I even tried switching the Light Crosses out for Blue Talismans+ w/+10% max MP on everyone, approaching or exceeding 800 DEF on the whole team, and changing Formation to the GUTS/DEF/Status Immunity one, and we could tank an extra hit or so, but we still just couldn't deal with him, he's crazy! 😅

[bkdubs123]

OMG! That fight was BRUTAL!

I forgot all about the Godslayer and Knuckles of Hope. Not only do they give a decent bump to DEF on their own, but they freed up accessory slots with their 50% MP cost reduction so I could layer even more DEF.

Changing the party up once again, I finally beat Metatron after a lengthy slugfest. I stacked defense as much as possible with 961 on Claude, 852 on Dias, 805 on Chisato (ranged break support), and 685 on Rena. I entered the fight in the Upper Guard formation for +50% more DEF on everyone, and then opened with Angel Feather and an Ointment of Veda, and then I repeatedly stacked Guard, healed, rezzed, repeated Angel Feathers and Guards, and when I had the chance I had Rena cast Gravity Crush to help break him. Around half health he would spam his invulnerability a lot more, bringing Dias and Chisato down often despite me telling them run and evade and me running Claude over to spam Sword of Life in their faces. Sometimes he would kill someone from max HP while I stood right next to them spamming Sword of Life. It was absurd.

But we finally triumphed. There were a few moments where it felt like I was losing control of the fight. Two members down and his shields one hit away from breaking when he'd activate invulnerability and wreck my progress. But in the end, after a nail-biter, we prevailed.

What a fight!

[bkdubs123]

After Metatron I wanted to relax a bit, it's a casual run after all. I hit up Fun City and did some Arena battles for dubious rewards (though Welch got a nice damage boost. I also finally got the Deadly Edge because I forgot to grab it after the Lacuer Tournament and made Aeterna, so B-Team has two huge damage fighters now). We leveled to about 82 or something in this way. Nabbed a Symbol of Antiquity and went on our way.

The beam trio welcoming us to Phynal: Round 2? The A-Team (Ashton, Dias, Precis, and Chisato) tore through them like tissue paper. Satisfying after the humbling beating Metatron gave them.

Angel Feather and Reflection on the Assault Formation. It's a helluva drug.

Also, Mephistofar + Lightspeed + Berserker Ring with some Piercing Blades as a shield-nuking shotgun? It's a thing of beauty.

That's gonna be it for me today, but I'm sure I'll get back to my Crafting rebalance thread a little later. Time to take it easy, enjoy your weekend guys!

[Second Duke Revier]

Nice! What do you mean by "Resistance" on the Assault Formation, though? I can't recall any such spell or special move.

[bkdubs123]

İlk olarak Second Duke of Aeria Revier tarafından gönderildi:

Nice! What do you mean by "Resistance" on the Assault Formation, though? I can't recall any such spell or special move.

Oh, Reflection, my bad 😅