Recommend a team to tackle Shangri'la!

[The Schachter]

(Warning: Severe long-windedness ahead! There's a TL;DR at the end)

Hello everyone! First, a little bit about me to give some context for my request. I'm a relatively new player to this game; I bought it when the DLC came out and fell in love with it (so much that I immediately bought More to Explore after my first playthrough), but got sidetracked shortly afterwards and only recently got back to playing it. I'd like to think I'm doing pretty well for myself, as I've been able to reliably win on Adventure-Classic, but I'm obviously no master (for reference, my highest score was 4281 with a team of Charles, Earl and Ivan). My current goal is simply to unlock all of the crew members as captains, and I'm getting quite close; I'm also trying to make each playthrough varied and different from the last, in order to see as much of the game as possible.

With that in mind, there's only one expedition I've never completed: Shangri'la. I've only tried it once, after selecting "One... More... Expedition..." following a successful run, and lost to the boss despite reaching the encounter with about 5-7 resolve (2 out of 3 keys). I'm sure a better and more experienced player would have won, but it would have been the 6th expedition anyway, and that's not really "beating" Shangri'la, now, is it? ;)

I really want to make a proper attempt, but I'm also a bit of a wuss and I really hate the idea of getting a Game Over on the last expedition :P So while I'm currently more than halfway through a very fun Friendly-oriented playthrough with Maria, Emilia and HIldegard, I'm already thinking ahead to the next one. I would have only one goal: Choose Shangri'la as my fifth expedition and win. No concern for score. And to find the confidence to commit to this, I'd like to have a team which is naturally well suited for the expedition.

Since I know very little about the place (to be completely honest I've basically forgotten everything I learned on my first time other than the Keys mechanic and the nature of the final boss), I've decided to consult the knowledgeable people of this forum. I'm not looking for in-depth strategies or precise character builds, but rather a basic crew setup with strengths, skills and perks which makes them a good choice for a relative newbie tackling this final challenge..

(Additionally, if possible, I'd love it if this team had Agatha or Molly (or both?!), as I've yet to unlock them as captains.)

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TL;DR: Looking for a crew which is inately well-suited to beat Shangri'la. Preferably with Molly and/or Agatha as a crew member so I can unlock them as captains.

Many thanks!

[Lord Reliant]

Welcome, The Schachter, to the community. I'm certainly not the most qualified person here to give you advice (I'm a pretty mediocre player), but it sounds like your philosophy and experiences are similar to mine. It's the danger of REIS being a rogue-like, potentially losing out on your final run. For me, that's when it becomes a fun-killer, so I'm pretty conservative when it comes to choosing a 5 star run. Unless I have 6 or more Resolve, I'll opt for something more tame.

For a generally good, versatile team, I'd recommend Agatha, Harry, and Victor. You get good defense, one of each type of explorer, a good ability to deal with crowds of enemies, and a variety of different types of perks and attitudes. I'm sure there are much more powerful combos out there, but in terms of a robust team, that's a good one. I also find that adding Emilia to any team really bolsters its ability to survive since her healing and defense are so good.

I hope you can participate in some of the challenges either by playing or writing. Thanks for posting, and I'll let the veteran players give their thoughts on party compositions and tips.

[aimer]

I'm not a particularly good player compared to some of the guys hanging out around here, but I've beaten Shangri-La on Impossible for the first time a few days ago with a team of Victor, Philippe and Pedrinho.

[dman11235]

I recommend checking out the various guides here. But if your goal is simply beat Shangri-La, then things are a little easier. Obviously the most important bit is the combat for that, making sure you have a nice spread of powerful abilities so you can break down on the weaknesses and avoid resistances and immunities. A wonderful combo, for instance, will be Hildegaard and Pedrhino. Hildegaard can be a tank in speech battles like this, with her good speech defense and ability to heal essentially everything based on how many Excited people are on the board. You also have an Impress and an Excite ability, which is a good enough spread on Friendly abilities to work with things. Another good approach might be to go with come glass cannons, Harry is probably the best and easiest to use for this. His cone attack can help deal a lot of damage to a lot of enemies. Combine with a healer and a tank or two, and you have a VERY serviceable crew. Jan-Piet, Kwame, Hildegaard, Victor, Emilia, Dolores, Ivan, Phillipe, and even Molly and Kiwi work well with him. Do keep in mind that the captain's perk will help you out in battle because if you have enough stuff, equipment and trinkets, that will make things easier. So maybe focus on a gold based captain for this. Molly+Harry, Dolores+Harry (especially using Harry's card), Pedrhino, Victor, and Harry are all gold based.

Another thing to keep in mind is perks. They are important even for battle, as they improve stats, but especially for Shangi-La because you need to pass those skill checks to get the keys. And each key you get makes things easier. So take a look at the treasure guide and maybe note what skills you need to pass those checks, remembering that one has a battle (the first one) but you still need the checks.

[The BlackVision]

Just a little to add to what people have suggested here, and a couple of minor spoilers regarding the check for keys - up to you if you want to see them or not

**Spoilers for people who haven't been to Shang before! Spoilers for anything else is tagged as spoilers beneath**

For the Heart Key, don't take Charles/Maria - they can get Schmoozed so you can't use them for the skill check! For other advice, for getting the keys, aim to get around 5 in either diplomacy/beguiler/quick thinker on one character, athelete/survivalist/rogue on another and Tactician/Naturalist/Archeology for another.

Otherwise, do your best to get top-tier defence items for Shangri-La, and watch out for the encounters with demons - the green ones are glass cannons, so take them down fast. For the end-battle, yeah, you're mainly after speech defence and the ability to change mood quicky as they'll switch often to the worst mod available for you.

Finally, main advice for the battle is to use the terrain - if you can, funnel them so only one or two can reach you at a time and keep them in aggressive stance so they can only attack from a range of 1 square while you pick off Amir/Cassandra. If you're feeling lucky, you can also try a rush on Riv himself, but you'll have to make it snappy or they can do a lot of damage if you're exposed.

Otherwise it's the order you go for them. I recommend Amir first since he's got scary movement and range so he can hit anyone easily, then Cassandra to stop the heals and AoEs and impresses, then Tommy, then Riv himself, assuming you've got a capable healer. If you're all damage, best bet is to just kill Riv asap.

[Flamestalker]

Getting all the keys is key (I know, bad joke) if you're not experienced yet with the fight against Rivaleux, letting him get the buffs can be really dangerous.

To increase your odds at the keys you should bring a team that has a good chance at completing the checks, you should aim to have atleast 5 of the perks needed for the check, as with less it really becomes quite the gamble whether you'll succeed or not.
The following perks are used in checks for the keys.

Cave of the Crane: Archaeologist + Naturalist + Tactician.
Temple of Yab-Yum: Diplomat + Beguiler, or Quick Thinker
Tiger Mountain: Athlete + Survivalist, or Rogue + Survivalist

Gold and Supplies are important too, if you're inexperienced then going to Shangri-La with less than Adventure lvl gear and less than 15 supplies can be really dangerous.

As for a crew, I'd recommend Victor, Pedrinho and Hildegard, with Victor as advised Captain. Victor is pretty simple captain to use and with Anthropology and some traders he can rake in quite a bit of money. Pedrinho could work too as a gold captain but he is a bit more difficult.

I recommend Victor specialises in his Tactician branch, it gives you extra stats at the start of several fights and works well in the Cave of the Crane. As a secondary perk to add to this I recommend Archaeology as it add nicely for the Cave of the Crane and the other normal checks in the area. A Diplomacy build can also work for him, but then you need someone else to do the Cave of the Crane. Victor is good in fights all around and a strong Encourage can make short work of Amir, he has decent healing skills as well making him a safe pick.

Pedrinho's Survivalist skills will help greatly for Tiger Mountain, maybe add Athlete or Rogue on top of it to increase your chances. He can also serve as a Beguiler but that might mean you have to sacrifice his Survivalist perks, and then you dont have anyone for the Mountain. His Excite will keep your team's Speech up, Party Time for a strong AoE skill with healing potential and his Disarm skill can safe your life when Tommy/Rivaleux start punching you.

I recommend Hildegard as your Diplomat for Yab-Yum, and possibly add some Beguiler on top to increase your chances there. You can also build her the Naturalist route so she can do the Cave of the Crane, just make sure you still have someone that can do Yab-Yum if you do.
Hildegard is a good healer and Dance can give you extra defensive stats when needed. On lvl 5 double Impress can make sure the Green Demons and Tommy go down Quick, or make her really sustained with Excited Spirit with Pedrinho making sure your entire team is Excited.

[The BlackVision]

Um, have to disagree with a lot of that - Victor isn't a simple captain for starters. You have to know what you're fighting and where to take advantage of encounters to use Anthropology well, and for just beating Shang, he gives absolutely no advantage - just extra renown and a tiny bit of gold.

If you want simple captain, take Ivan or Kiwi for supplies and Anna or Charles for lots of resources - they require very little work to make their perk work for them - for Anna just focus on research and Charles on Specialist entourages and they'll do all the hard work for you.

And while the details are correct, it's always better for Shangri-La to have a lot of the same perk tree than to have a little of each for the rolls, which is how that phrasing implies it.

[Welsh Dragon]

Originally posted by BlackVision:

Um, have to disagree with a lot of that - Victor isn't a simple captain for starters. You have to know what you're fighting and where to take advantage of encounters to use Anthropology well, and for just beating Shang, he gives absolutely no advantage - just extra renown and a tiny bit of gold.

If you want simple captain, take Ivan or Kiwi for supplies and Anna or Charles for lots of resources - they require very little work to make their perk work for them - for Anna just focus on research and Charles on Specialist entourages and they'll do all the hard work for you.

And while the details are correct, it's always better for Shangri-La to have a lot of the same perk tree than to have a little of each for the rolls, which is how that phrasing implies it.

I'd advise against Ivan as Captain for new players, as starting the game with only one Resolve can be quite a drawback. It's not quite so bad once you have more Resolve from completing expeditions, but I've had promising starts fail on a starter island to a bad Amir roll.

All the Best,

Welsh Dragon.

[aimer]

How about Bia as a captain for free stats and strong triple/quadruple slash? Status research tree even allows you to add -25 armor to Terrify, so I figure Bia + strong terrifiers like Anna should be pretty powerful.

[Flamestalker]

If you think that you're ready for Shangri-La, then I asume you know the game well enough to know how to use Victor as a captain. And it isn't a little bit of gold, that 50% becomes big quickly after a few traders.

If you're going to argue that way then I wouldn't call Charles and Anna easy either, both of them can have trouble with gold generation if the bonuses dont go right. Kiwi and Ivan have alot of supplies yes, but they tend to be a bit lacking in other resources which can makemaking Shangri-La a deathtrap.

As for the perks I was thinking along the lines of 5+2, could've worded it a bit better I agree.

[Welsh Dragon]

Originally posted by aimeroski:

How about Bia as a captain for free stats and strong triple/quadruple slash? Status research tree even allows you to add -25 armor to Terrify, so I figure Bia + strong terrifiers like Anna should be pretty powerful.

Could work. I completed Shangrila for the first time with Bia as Captain. She can become quite the single target damage dealer if you play her right.

All the Best,

Welsh Dragon.

[The BlackVision]

Bia works, but depends if you're comfortable with her on the anti-aggressive locations or know routes that avoid them, as while she's one of the best v aggressive, she's less capable taking speech hit if she doesn't dodge, which can be a nasty shock, especially in that final battle.

As for Victor via Anthro- you need to know what you're up against in fights to use it right. If you haven't been there, by default you don't know Shang's fights, and it's better to be capable of adjusting to suit the battle than to be forcing yourself into one attitude against enemies you're not used to. And that gold absolutely is tiny compared to leaders who focus purely on gold generation. Victor's a half and half and good at it, but if the renown doesn't matter, he's weaker for it on that front.

If you want gold, Hatice is greatif you're comfortable with long range glass cannons as she generates a lot of money, Earl is straightforwards and encourages a spread of research and gives gold for doing so; etc.

[aimer]

I know that's not a very flexible setup, but if you REALLY want gold, Molly (captain) + Harry + Philippe is an easy 150+ collect tokens throughout a run by my quick calculation.

[The Schachter]

Wow, thanks so much to all of you for your advice! It's pretty awesome to see the variety in suggestions. I've completed the run I mentioned in my original post (A bit over 5000 renown, new high score! Also I got to see Maria one-shot the Count boss, it was awesome), but I haven't had the time to get back into the game and consider the options carefully, so I've not yet decided on the specifics. That said, having a good idea in how to distribute perks among my crew is really helpful! I'll consider all of your suggestions and aim to have a team with good perk distribution, strong skill synergies and the ability to generate lots of gold to gear up properly.

Looking forward to starting a new adventure!

[dman11235]

On the Kiwi as captain thing, I can say from experience that I love her as a captain for newer players. You aren't focusing on renown, you're focusing on getting through places. And her bonus supplies make it really easy to get through places. On the more advanced side of things, her perk does mean you can spend more time exploring certain expeditions (ones with a lot of naturalist rolls. So all of them), and more time exploring means more resources.

[The Schachter]

Well, I did it! I ended up going with Hatice (captain), Pedrihno and Victor; the idea was to use Victor to protect and support the two scouts wielding Friendly speech and Aggressive attacks, and have Hatice's captain perk boost my equipment throughout the game (also I just really like glass cannon-type characters). I imagined I'd be able to leverage the 50% physical attack bonus against friendly far more than I actually did in practice, but Hatice was so strong that it didn't matter anyway. I ended leaning very heavily on aggressive encounters supported by Anthropology research, which suggests I might have gotten better results with Victor as my captain (I don't know how much better or worse the gold payout would have been, but I got a *lot* of encounter tokens). I've never had such good equipment for my whole crew before, but considering how dangerous the encounters seem to be, it was definitely worth it.

Shangri'la itself wasn't *too* bad, thanks to the perk setup I had 80%+ success rate on the key challenges and got all three keys without problem (I did lose a point of resolve against Tommy, but that was a dumb tactical mistake on my part more than anything else). However, the layout of the expedition was extremely mean, with two keys on complete opposite sides of the map and the nodes connected in such a way that even with 17 total supplies (+ the bonus from Anthropology) I had to take two hunger penalties. And that's without chasing any other treasure!

Still, the boss fight wasn't too bad, though it seemed very scary at first! I managed to pick off Cassandra first but ended up in a messy brawl with the other three, and had to leave Amir for last even though he was the most dangerous one against my crew. Still, I got quite a few lucky dodges (I like to think it was the game appologizing for making me miss three 75% checks in a row during the Emerged island) and once his crew was down, I knocked Rivaleux out with resolve to spare!

I was very excited to find out that I once again beat my previous high score... and less amused at finding out that I'd actually been playing on Discovery mode this whole time >_> Not that it actually matters since I played the whole thing in one sitting assuming I was on Adventure mode and only noticed because of the ending score screen showing the discovery mode icon, but it does feel like it undermines the accomplishment somewhow.... (whatever, I can get the achievements next time!)

Regardless, I'm happy about my victory, and I wanted to share it and thank you all once again for the excellent advice; none of the suggestions made in this thread will go to waste, as I'll be trying some of the suggested crews next!

Normally, I'd still be doing a play-by-play recounting of the entire playthrough, but I stayed up way too late to finish the run and I'm falling asleep at my keyboard, so have a picture instead!

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=781062498

Once again, thanks to everyone for sharing advice and helping me do this!
Cheers!