Josette. She is not good but she may not be the worst.......to some. Also she is not bad.

[Oguzhan]

While writing a response in another discussion I ended doing what I consider to be a decent evaluation on josette, so I figured why not make a full discussion about it. Also I got a bit bored so why not? Keep in mind I am not trying to be like that one guy who kept on and on about how Josette is actually the best character in the game. No! This is just a calm, personal evaluation of the character after having played the game for like 285 hours. (I basically played it twice a year ever since it came out on steam, I love the sky games. Not counting my first run all of my playthroughs were on nightmare with 100% completion not counting item drop collection)

As we all know Josette is very low on the tier list. Her best suit is her support ability as it gives you the best item drop chance increase and sepith bonus. The game basically rewards you for putting her there. That being said at least she has that one use. I have played many games with completely useless characters. Josette at least has that one thing she is REALLY good at.

You also gotta remember while she is the worst character in the game, you can 100% complete the game with her. It's not like she can't have any support crafts and/or can't do any damage to an enemy. And some of her crafts do have impressive uses. For example that gun craft is good for putting distance between you and an enemy.

It's just everyone does everything she can do better.

Few examples:

1: Putting distance between you and the enemy: Orbal Gear can do that for 10 CP while also inflicting 10k+ damage to the boss. (Enfeeble, Str up, Carnage, Ultimate Weapon)
You can also use dark matter EX to drag multiple enemies at once while also doing an impressive amount of damage. The craft does have the ability to reduce an enemy's defense which is really useful but Kloe's kemplar craft and the enfeeble spell do that too, if not better.

2: Earth Wall: While she is better than physical attackers in this area but every magic caster is better than her thanks to their better orbments.

3: Plunger: Schera has a MUCH better version of it as her version is basically the luminous divider of stealing.

But hey, like I have said before, she is the best support when it comes to sepith grinding and luck which DOES MATTER since there are some really cool item drops in this game like the gem tier quartz from the spiders in Abyss, the drop equipments, food weapons like sepith bullets which you can get before the chapter 1 boss benuo to 3 shot him etc etc... Thanks to Josette's support bonus, fortune (this games version of luck), Divine Eye (it has luck as one of its bonuses) and phantom thief's cape, you can increase your item drop chances to the point where you always get drops from every enemy in a fight. Just make sure to not give these to Orbal Gear Tita cause unless I am mistaken she ignores them but I am not sure. Correct me on that if I am wrong.

And I know this is going to sound weird but her support ability might actually make her more useful than some of the other characters to some. Why? Well people usually tend to go for certain characters when playing this game since this is basically the only time they get to do so. For these people the other characters don't really matter despite how useful they can be. For example Mueller's ragna bind craft is amazing against doppelgänger Kevin, as it disables the boss from giving shields to the cannon ads. However, most people don't use these kind of strats as they are comfortable with taking their time during boss fights. Also most people don't play on nightmare.

Meaning Josette offers a really useful bonus when not fighting a boss unlike other characters.

Personally, I like to mix and match when playing this game BUT even I don't play with characters like Agate, Olivier, Kloe, Zin and Estelle (basically the FC cast) despite loving them so much both as characters and game-play pieces. Sure I love Estelle but I just finished FC and SC so why would I wanna use her again unless I am going for dialogue (keep mind all of the aforementioned characters are really useful, hell Kloe has the best ATS in the game unless I am mistaken). When I play 3rd I usually stick to Mueller, Julia, Ries, Kevin, Orbal Gear, Renne and Richard.

Anyway, all said and done, Josette is one of the worst characters in the game, in terms of gameplay, there is no argument there BUT she does have that one really good use and that use alone might make her better than some of the other characters in the eyes of some. Personally she is still at the bottom of my personal tier list but hey, everyone's got their opinion.

[butterbattle22]

I actually thought that defense debuff was her best craft. At least, I personally got more use out of that one than the knockback.

Edit: Oh wait, is that the same craft? My memory of it is pretty poor.

2nd edit: Hmmm, okay, yeah, it was stampede. It's the same one. -30% defense and knockback. Definitely a good skill.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by butterbattle22:

I actually thought that defense debuff was her best craft. At least, I personally got more use out of that one than the knockback.

Edit: Oh wait, is that the same craft? My memory of it is pretty poor.

2nd edit: Hmmm, okay, yeah, it was stampede. It's the same one. -30% defense and knockback. Definitely a good skill.

Oh yeah I kinda forgot about its defense lowering capabilities, that's my bad, especially considering how many enemies in this game are weak against enfeeble which reduces the defense of the enemies, including a lot of the bosses, even the ones in abyss. Quite the useful ability if I do say so myself, heavily recommended to experiment with. Let me add her enfeeble effect actually.

She is completely useless in SC however :D. Since at the point where you get her almost all bosses are strong against enfeeble if not all of them.

[Evil Gambio]

Enfeeble is actually better than stampede actually.
I do not know why the devs did this or wether it was a mistake, but Enfeeble does -50% DEF, not -25% that is listed on the description. I had to check the game's files to see this, but yes, it's actually -50% DEF for enfeeble.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Evil Gambio:

Enfeeble is actually better than stampede actually.
I do not know why the devs did this or wether it was a mistake, but Enfeeble does -50% DEF, not -25% that is listed on the description. I had to check the game's files to see this, but yes, it's actually -50% DEF for enfeeble.

Hence the 16k damage done by Orbal Gear is explained. Ahhh I really wish someone had fixed the Loewe fight. From what I remember hearing, he is supposed to summon multiple clones but he doesn't really do it which leads him to be easier than Cassius and the Enforcers.

[Hopyoprop]

Meanwhile, Evil Gambio using your documents you gave I fully understood t_magic so I actually buffed up josette and I know how to modify description lengths and all now. Made quite a decent patch. Also fixes the broken description on enfeeble and also fixes Richard's first s-craft being space element for whatever reason.

[Hopyoprop]

My patch is available on the steam discussion forums.

The whole changelog of my modiifcations include:

- Modified her stampede to have a damage modifier + now deals SPD - 30% (in SC), 50% (In TC, follows her EVO Percent)
- Anchor Flail has more range and has a slight damage scaling now
- Plunder now impedes following her EVO, Description now has the percent chance of steal. (90%)
- (Third only) Orbal bomb has a scaling now so does a bit more damage & also confuses. (Her EVO is sleep but there isn't a effect coded to be damage+sleep, only Damage+Confuse)
- Bobcat has slightly increased damage and now follows EVO and gives DEF/ADF debuff. I set it for 30% (SC) , 35% in (Third) & Bobcat 2 does 50% debuff (Follows her EVO stats)
- Fix for Richard First S-Craft being space element
- Fix for Enfeeble description being 25% instead of 50%
- Schera's Fox Tail description now says the percent chance of steal (50%)
- Crossgear Rage 1 & 2 has a higher damage modifier.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Hopyoprop:

My patch is available on the steam discussion forums.

The whole changelog of my modiifcations include:

- Modified her stampede to have a damage modifier + now deals SPD - 30% (in SC), 50% (In TC, follows her EVO Percent)
- Anchor Flail has more range and has a slight damage scaling now
- Plunder now impedes following her EVO, Description now has the percent chance of steal. (90%)
- (Third only) Orbal bomb has a scaling now so does a bit more damage & also confuses. (Her EVO is sleep but there isn't a effect coded to be damage+sleep, only Damage+Confuse)
- Bobcat has slightly increased damage and now follows EVO and gives DEF/ADF debuff. I set it for 30% (SC) , 35% in (Third) & Bobcat 2 does 50% debuff (Follows her EVO stats)
- Fix for Richard First S-Craft being space element
- Fix for Enfeeble description being 25% instead of 50%
- Schera's Fox Tail description now says the percent chance of steal (50%)
- Crossgear Rage 1 & 2 has a higher damage modifier.

Does Schwarzritter spam clones?

[Hopyoprop]

my patch only touches the stats of abilities so I didn't actually adjust monster behaviours

[Evil Gambio]

I mean, making Scharzritter spam clones wouldn't be that hard since AI isn't that hard to mod.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by Evil Gambio:

I mean, making Scharzritter spam clones wouldn't be that hard since AI isn't that hard to mod.

I specifically want that to happen because I remember hearing he was supposed to spam clones in his fight originally.

[butterbattle22]

My understanding is that he was supposed to start spamming clones below a certain hp threshold. It was supposed to be near max, but was set near death for some reason. So this might as simple as changing a single value. Although I haven't actually looked at the game files so I could just be talking out of my ***.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by butterbattle22:

My understanding is that he was supposed to start spamming clones below a certain hp threshold. It was supposed to be near max, but was set near death for some reason. So this might as simple as changing a single value. Although I haven't actually looked at the game files so I could just be talking out of my ***.

Honestly, just change that and I am good. The definitive version of the game for me. The cassius and loewe duo doesn't need a change but Shwarzritter needs it.

I do wanna try out the hard mode one day though. Is it complete? Glitch free? as in does it cause extra glitches?

[zefyris]

there's a gun that drops from one of the monster type for her in both golden and silver roads which makes her a very good damage dealer btw.
Adding to that her -30% DF that is way more accessible than enfeeble at this point, if you put her on one team and Kloe on the other (since they're the only one with a craft like that) it helps a lot during the boss fight.

[Oguzhan]

Originally posted by zefyris:

there's a gun that drops from one of the monster type for her in both golden and silver roads which makes her a very good damage dealer btw.
Adding to that her -30% DF that is way more accessible than enfeeble at this point, if you put her on one team and Kloe on the other (since they're the only one with a craft like that) it helps a lot during the boss fight.

Not sure if I mentioned those weapons in the original post but those weapons make EVERYONE a good damage dealer so they don't count. By that logic Olivier is better since he has an AoE physical hit craft. Also, Mueller gets his weapon in the same dungeon sooooo yeah.

As for her def reduction, it is outclassed by Enfeeble and Kemplar as the former is an AoE spell and the latter is a craft that also reduces attack. Also, Kloe has the best ATS, meaning she is not just standing there for one craft and then as a mediocre earth wall user.

[zefyris]

Originally posted by Oguzhan:

Originally posted by zefyris:

there's a gun that drops from one of the monster type for her in both golden and silver roads which makes her a very good damage dealer btw.
Adding to that her -30% DF that is way more accessible than enfeeble at this point, if you put her on one team and Kloe on the other (since they're the only one with a craft like that) it helps a lot during the boss fight.

Not sure if I mentioned those weapons in the original post but those weapons make EVERYONE a good damage dealer so they don't count. By that logic Olivier is better since he has an AoE physical hit craft. Also, Mueller gets his weapon in the same dungeon sooooo yeah.

As for her def reduction, it is outclassed by Enfeeble and Kemplar as the former is an AoE spell and the latter is a craft that also reduces attack. Also, Kloe has the best ATS, meaning she is not just standing there for one craft and then as a mediocre earth wall user.

you don't have olivier during the mentionned period, you get him at the end of it.
And since those are drops honestly except if you fartm for them you won't get all of them. Also if Mueller got his pendragon you don't have to bother with anyone else dealing damage since that weapon is just absurd for the place it drops.