Beginners Guide! (Spoiler Free)

[Croak]

So I thought I'd make a basic beginner's guide for everyone new to the game. I'm a console DD vet so I'd like to think I know what I'm talking about :P

1: There is a new game plus, so don't feel bad if you messed something up and want to start over. You keep all your items, levels and skills when you transition over!

2: There are missable quests. If you care about being a completionist, there are several guides going over each quest that can be missed, and when they become available as well as when they're no longer available! (http://www.xboxachievements.com/forum/showthread.php?t=372407)

3: Food items spoil! In the starting village the woman who runs the shop will sell you an unlimited amount of Airtight Flasks. These are cheap, and can be combined with every single spoilable item in the game. This serves 2 functions by telling you if the item in question spoils by appearing in the combination options, and prevents food from ever spoiling by combining it with said food!

4: Be aware, sometimes you WANT food to spoil! For example, sour meat is a delicacy in Gransys, and once it's spoiled it sells for 5x more! Many fruit also benefit from spoiling, particularly apples and grapes, which can be combined with water after spoiling to make wine, which is an excellent, easy to produce healing item. 2 rare items of note that you should always allow to spoil then preserve so they don't rot are eggs and ambrosial meat. Ambrosial meat is particularly rare, and the sour version is needed for several quests.

5. There are a bunch of fetch quests, but usually the reward is well worth the effort put in. If you get a fetch quest and have no idea where to find the item(s), don't feel bad about looking up where to find them. Many only appear regularly in very specific locations, such as Giant Fish.

6. After you've gotten far enough in the storyline, you'll get an item called a Portcrystal. There are a total of 5 in the game, and they become purchaseable in NG+. You can place them anywhere on the map, then use a Ferrystone to teleport directly to them (Ferrystones can be bought for 20k each at The Black Cat in Gran Soren) [EDIT: Been brought to my attention you get a free, unlimited use Ferrystone once you check in at the Gran Soren Inn, sorry guys, forgot about that :P]. The placed Portcrystals remain when you transition to NG+, so don't worry about picking them up before finishing the game!

7. There are a LOT of the infamous escort quests. And a lot of them have really good rewards, which makes them even harder to just ignore. But there's a trick to make them incredibly easy. There are only a handful of locations any character will ever want to go to, and they will teleport with you when using a ferrystone. So you can completely ignore them if you want in your first playthrough, then finish them in less than 30 seconds with your second if you've placed portcrystals appropriately!

8. Get new Pawns often. Only your main pawn, the one you create, will level with you. Don't go into a fight at level 20 against an ogre with pawns that are only level 6!

9. Your class, or Vocation, determines the stats you gain on each level. As soon as you hit level 10, I recommend you run back to the starting village and speak to the woman on the pier at night. She ferries you to the DLC area, and serves as a full Inn at the entrance. She will let you change your vocation there, where as the only other person who will allow you to do this is the innkeeper in Gran Soren. And chances are you'll be level 10 long before you step foot in those gates, unless you're speedrunning the main quest.

9.5: Breaking down the classes as far as stats go, Fighter is best for damage and health until level 10. Strider is best for Stamina and otherwise has relatively balanced stats until level 10. Mage is obviously best for magic until level 10. After you hit level 10, the stat increases of those classes drop, and advanced and hybrid classes become available for 1000 and 1500 discipline, respectively. After level 10, the Warrior is by far the best for health, and close second for damage. Assassin has the best damage levelling among all the classes, and are also close second for stamina. Ranger is the best for stamina, but is otherwise nothing special, so I'd recommend the Assassin instead. Sorcerer boasts both the highest magic attack and defense, but every other one of its stats are rather abysmal. Magick Archer and Mystic Knight are both well balanced, and meant for their skills than stat training.

10: Each class gets different Augments. However, any class can use any augment, as long as they've unlocked it by being a different class previously. This can lead to extremely powerful character builds. For example, the Warrior's Bastion augment greatly reduces physical damage. A sorcerer who would otherwise be an easy kill for a melee user can use Bastion and become a nightmare for everyone on the battlefield. Vice versa, the Sorcerer has an ability called Awareness that does the same for magic defense, and a Warrior or Assassin can use it to conquer their weakness to magic users and allow them to close in on their targets much more safely. Experiment to find the most hellish combination of augments you can manage! ;)

11. A final tip I really should have mentioned much earlier! ONLY MAGES CAN USE HEALING MAGIC! So don't get a sorcerer pawn and expect them to be able to heal you, because even if they learned the spell as a Mage, only Mages can cast the spells. Sorcerers are meant solely for devastating magic attacks that can flatten even drakes with a few casts, hence why they're so weak everywhere else.

I hope this helped and maybe taught you something. Anyone else who's played DD before should feel free to add anything they think is important that I left out! :)

[Miporin]

Not a vet here, but your guide mixed DD and DD:DA together.

haven't read them all, just skim through for an idea for my group's guide. these 2 catch my eye.

Първоначално публикувано от Croak90:

...

3: Food items spoil! In the starting village the woman who runs the shop will sell you an unlimited amount of Airtight Flasks. These are cheap, and can be combined with every single spoilable item in the game. This serves 2 functions by telling you if the item in question spoils by appearing in the combination options, and prevents food from ever spoiling by combining it with said food!

...

6. After you've gotten far enough in the storyline, you'll get an item called a Portcrystal. There are a total of 5 in the game, and they become purchaseable in NG+. You can place them anywhere on the map, then use a Ferrystone to teleport directly to them (Ferrystones can be bought for 20k each at The Black Cat in Gran Soren). The placed Portcrystals remain when you transition to NG+, so don't worry about picking them up before finishing the game!

...

those flasks and ferrystones are FAQs from DD, not DD:DA.

edit: forget the changes, no flask for sale, and reduced price.

[Loune]

WHERE IS THE THUMBS UP BUTTON?

[76561197963259080]

This is a great post, should publish it as a guide:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/367500/guides/

[♪～くまモン～♪]

If you want to max out your Atk, go lv1-10: fighter lv11-200 assassin and choose whatever class you like to play.
For magic user, go lv1-10 mage and lv11-200 sorcerer. You will need very high M.atk if you want to play magick archer or mystic knight.

[Joel]

Thanks!

Edit: I've also copied it to notepad so I can reference it a bit more effectively

[Croak]

Първоначално публикувано от Miporin:

Not a vet here, but your guide mixed DD and DD:DA together.

haven't read them all, just skim through for an idea for my group's guide. these 2 catch my eye.

Първоначално публикувано от Croak90:

...

3: Food items spoil! In the starting village the woman who runs the shop will sell you an unlimited amount of Airtight Flasks. These are cheap, and can be combined with every single spoilable item in the game. This serves 2 functions by telling you if the item in question spoils by appearing in the combination options, and prevents food from ever spoiling by combining it with said food!

...

6. After you've gotten far enough in the storyline, you'll get an item called a Portcrystal. There are a total of 5 in the game, and they become purchaseable in NG+. You can place them anywhere on the map, then use a Ferrystone to teleport directly to them (Ferrystones can be bought for 20k each at The Black Cat in Gran Soren). The placed Portcrystals remain when you transition to NG+, so don't worry about picking them up before finishing the game!

...

those flasks and ferrystones are FAQs from DD, not DD:DA.

edit: forget the changes, no flask for sale, and reduced price.

Realized and fixed the ferrystone portion, what's nonfactual about the food spoilage and flasks?

[Croak]

Първоначално публикувано от RetriButioN:

This is a great post, should publish it as a guide:
https://steamcommunity.com/app/367500/guides/

Tried but I get some nondescript error so I gave up. But consider this permission to make the guide using my post if you like!

[MissBunny]

Thanks for well written tips - just starting my Dd:DA journey, so I am grateful for the advice.