Orbment lines

[Verez Krieger]

What happened to the orbment lines and how does this system work without them.

[Dr. Rudolf von Richten]

The Cold steel Battle Orbments and Quartz are simplified compared to those in Sky and Crossbell.

In Sky/Crossbell, Quartz give both a Direct Effect, such as a Stat Modifier or a chance to inflict a Status Effect with an attack, and a certain Elemental Value. Arts become available by reaching specific Elemental Values across all Quartz in an Orbment Line.

In Cold Steel, Quartz give either a Direct Effect, or an Art (sometimes more than one), this means that there's no more Elemental Value and the Orbment Line as such no longer has any effect on a characters opportunity to gain access to any given Art.

Orbment Lines do still matter in that certain Quartz, like those that give a chance of inflicting a Status Effect, can now be slotted once per Line, instead of once per Orbment, which means that a long Orbment Line is a disadvantage in this respect.

On the other hand, the longer an Orbment Line, the more EP (and the higher ATS) the character will have, so a long Orbment Line is still an indicator of a character being best as a Caster, and multiple short lines still indicate a Fighter.

Two more things to note:
1): The Central Quartz slot is now for 'Master Quartz' which have multiple Direct Effects and or Arts, and gain 'XP' and level up like characters do, unlocking more powers with each level. [N.B.: Master Quartz were actually first introduced in Trails to Azure, but in that game, they're still part of the Elemental Value System.]
2): Characters can equip multiple Quarts with the same Direct Effect but a different level; Attack 1, Attack 2 and Attack 3 for example. This means you can really focus certain characters in specific directions, particularly non-casters, who often have slots 'left over' once the essentials (Action, Attack and Hit) have been taken.

In all, it's neither better or worse than the Elemental Value system, just different. On one level, it's simpler, but the freedom to give characters multiple Direct Effect Quartz of a similar kind and/or to directly choose the Arts you actually want to use enables more customization than in the Elemental Value system, where there were a select few good builds, for casters especially, and the rest was distinctly sub-optimal.

Coming from Sky, I myself initially wasn't much of a fan of the Cold Steel Orbment system, but I've since grown to appreciate it as an equally interesting and worthwhile take on the Orbment/Quartz concept. Give it a chance, and hopefully you will too!

[Verez Krieger]

Wow thanks for the very in depth review on how it works, that was just the kind of explanation i was looking for.
Now that I got the jist of it it'll be alot more interesting to tinker around with.
Thanks again!

[Dr. Rudolf von Richten]

Originally posted by Verez Krieger:

Wow thanks for the very in depth review on how it works, that was just the kind of explanation i was looking for.
Now that I got the jist of it it'll be alot more interesting to tinker around with.
Thanks again!

You're welcome!

[Kartoffelsuppe]

Originally posted by Dr. Rudolf von Richten:

In all, it's neither better or worse than the Elemental Value system, just different.

If you turn quartz into arts then anybody can slot anything in any order which means that orbments turn into pretty trnkets.

Originally posted by Dr. Rudolf von Richten:

a long Orbment Line is still an indicator of a character being best as a Caster, and multiple short lines still indicate a Fighter.

This is Cold Steel not FC although I don't think this even holds true in FC since the games are designed around people using crafts and arts.

[Mistfox]

Originally posted by Kartoffelsuppe:

This is Cold Steel not FC although I don't think this even holds true in FC since the games are designed around people using crafts and arts.

Yes but there are varying degrees as to how suited a character is for casting arts. Like Rudolf said, any character with long orbment lines tend to be casters (For FC, that is because longer lines = better Arts, while for CS1, it's because of the lack of ability to slot in more effects that are triggered by hits) while characters with short orbment lines are more melee attackers since they can stack effects.

[Exia_]

question does Orbments get stronger in each game, or can someone use old one fighting someone with new one

[Stabbey]

Everyone tends to shift to new orbments at once since the developers don't want to have to explain two slightly different orbment mechanics in one game. In the first game of an arc series you always need to unlock each slot after the first, but in the second game of the arc, all slots start out unlocked, but now you need to slowly increase their slot levels to use the rare/super rare quartz.

[Dr. Rudolf von Richten]

Originally posted by Stabbey:

In the first game of an arc series you always need to unlock each slot after the first, but in the second game of the arc, all slots start out unlocked, but now you need to slowly increase their slot levels to use the rare/super rare quartz.

For Sky FC --> SC (and 3rd), CS 1 --> CS 2 and CS 3 --> CS 4 this is true, but for the Crossbell games, the first one (Trails from Zero) has you both unlocking slots and upgrading them. Also, the second game (Trails to Azure) introduces 'Master Quartz' which is the biggest update to the Orbment system since Sky FC.