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Dragon Quest 9 |OT| Last chance* to shine
- Thread starter Aeana
- Start date
Getting ready to make my trek through the last dungeon (I believe,
)
Team update:
Here's a current pic of my team. SPOILERS. Don't click unless you've finished Upover completely.
http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g35/stylusninja/dq9team-719.jpg
The
armor set isn't the best armor I have for my Gladiator, but it looks great so I went with it. I was also using an Inferno Sword for a long time, but realized I could give up a measly 6 attack and get the HP-leech effect of the Uber Miracle Sword.
My team makeup:
BooJoh
Gladiator
Sword: 100
Shield: 100
Guts: 100
Courage: 90
Focus: 100
Fource: 10
Meryl
Thief
Claw: 100
Acquisitiveness: 100
Courage: 56
Focus: 22
Ruggedness: 100
Liam
Sage
Fan: 100
Enlightenment: 100
Faith: 100
Spellcraft: 100
Rena
Armamentalist
Bow: 100
Fource: 100
Courage: 56
Spellcraft: 68
Virtue: 32
going after Corvus
Team update:
Here's a current pic of my team. SPOILERS. Don't click unless you've finished Upover completely.
http://i52.photobucket.com/albums/g35/stylusninja/dq9team-719.jpg
The
Dragon Warrior
My team makeup:
BooJoh
Gladiator
Sword: 100
Shield: 100
Guts: 100
Courage: 90
Focus: 100
Fource: 10
Meryl
Thief
Claw: 100
Acquisitiveness: 100
Courage: 56
Focus: 22
Ruggedness: 100
Liam
Sage
Fan: 100
Enlightenment: 100
Faith: 100
Spellcraft: 100
Rena
Armamentalist
Bow: 100
Fource: 100
Courage: 56
Spellcraft: 68
Virtue: 32
I put some time into this over the weekend and it really is addictive - hours just flew by. For some reason, having it on a portable makes it that much easier to waste the hours away. It seems to go by a lot more quickly than previous Dragon Quests, and it definitely seems a bit easier in the beginning. Probably helped by the fact that you can choose to avoid a lot of the enemy encounters now (though it makes holy waters a bit pointless).
As much as I love it being on a portable, though, I have to say the DS's technical limits (or rather Level-5 pushing the DS's limits) are a bit distracting - the 2d sprites vs. 3d characters, framerate drops, etc. I've never considered myself a graphics or tech. whore, but this is one area where technical limitations actually seem to interfere with enjoying the game. I actually kept my party at three characters (which has been fine) to avoid taxing the system. Hopefully DQX on Wii won't be quite so bad (and maybe they'll return to portables with 3DS, where there'll be both portability and decent power).
I'm also not 100% wild about the translation, mainly the attempts at heavy regional accents. I appreciate that it's a lot more effort and character than goes into most translations, but it can be a bit distracting with the phonetic spellings of Scottish, Irish accents, etc. (I'm also playing through DQIV at the moment, where the accents are even stronger and borderline offensive - e.g. stereotyped Russian and Indian English - is there an equivalent in the Japanese text?) I can't imagine what a pain it'd be to parse the meaning of some dialogue if English were not my first language. Maybe it wasn't as noticeable in DQVIII because the voice acting meant you didn't have to read through a bunch of "guv'na"s and "blimey"s.
Those complaints aside, though, still a great game. Playing it at the same time as DQIV really highlights the differences / improvements from previous games that make it a bit more accessible, while still maintaining the DQ basics.
As much as I love it being on a portable, though, I have to say the DS's technical limits (or rather Level-5 pushing the DS's limits) are a bit distracting - the 2d sprites vs. 3d characters, framerate drops, etc. I've never considered myself a graphics or tech. whore, but this is one area where technical limitations actually seem to interfere with enjoying the game. I actually kept my party at three characters (which has been fine) to avoid taxing the system. Hopefully DQX on Wii won't be quite so bad (and maybe they'll return to portables with 3DS, where there'll be both portability and decent power).
I'm also not 100% wild about the translation, mainly the attempts at heavy regional accents. I appreciate that it's a lot more effort and character than goes into most translations, but it can be a bit distracting with the phonetic spellings of Scottish, Irish accents, etc. (I'm also playing through DQIV at the moment, where the accents are even stronger and borderline offensive - e.g. stereotyped Russian and Indian English - is there an equivalent in the Japanese text?) I can't imagine what a pain it'd be to parse the meaning of some dialogue if English were not my first language. Maybe it wasn't as noticeable in DQVIII because the voice acting meant you didn't have to read through a bunch of "guv'na"s and "blimey"s.
Those complaints aside, though, still a great game. Playing it at the same time as DQIV really highlights the differences / improvements from previous games that make it a bit more accessible, while still maintaining the DQ basics.
I picked up the game earlier today and I'm about two or so hours into it. While the beginning was pretty slow (mostly because I couldn't figure out how to progress the story in one part), the game seems to be pretty interesting in a "I'll play it for just 5 more minutes even though I said that about an hour ago" kind of way. Like with most RPGs where I actually have a choice, I ended up choosing a female main and I'll probably balance out the gender-ratio in the party once I get more members.
But something that the GameStop Manager told me while I was buying the game kind of worries me. He said that he had to start over because he didn't like his party or stat allocation. Should I really worry about being able to screw up my characters in regards to stats? So far, I have a foggy idea of my heroine mostly using swords, but who knows. Or should I just not even worry too much about allocating stats?
But something that the GameStop Manager told me while I was buying the game kind of worries me. He said that he had to start over because he didn't like his party or stat allocation. Should I really worry about being able to screw up my characters in regards to stats? So far, I have a foggy idea of my heroine mostly using swords, but who knows. Or should I just not even worry too much about allocating stats?
MechaX said:
I wouldn't worry about it - it'll save you a bit of time if you plan ahead a bit, but it's not too difficult to get extra points later on by changing to random classes and using metal slimes to gain levels / skill points relatively quickly.
Metal slimes being visible enemies makes experience boosting go relatively quickly - though I kind of regret spending so much time
running around Quarantbomb, avoiding enemies at every turn, in order to find the occasional Metal Slime, when Metal Medleys are a lot easier to find in the Bad Cave above Bloomingdale. In the room where you first see them, you just wait for three enemies to spawn; if none of them are Metal Medleys, you exit the room and re-enter, and a Metal Medley will eventually spawn - went a lot quicker than Quarantbomb, and for a lot more experience too.
Duane Cunningham
Member
jgwhiteus said:
Stornwell is definitely Scottish, and it's written differently than
Porth Laffan
ScrabbleDude
Member
Got my boat tonight and almost finished up with the academy. Guess I was supposed to go to Gleeba, but decided to do this instead. Wow. Alchemy overload. I want all of this stuff.
Easystride
Member
This game is giving me so many laughs, both intentionally and unintentionally.
For example, the awesome priest in Batsureg says
when you select divination. I guess I'm immature since I laughed at that :lol
For example, the awesome priest in Batsureg says
"The Almighty is coming in my ears, yo..."
Just got into Gleeba, taking my time with this game though I don't know if that is a good or bad thing. Still slightly disappointed that Sea Breeze from DQ4 is the ship's theme but what can you do.
Got a bucketload of quests to get through, as well as the treasure map, and unlocking Ranger. Will have to comb through those before I push any further.
Got a bucketload of quests to get through, as well as the treasure map, and unlocking Ranger. Will have to comb through those before I push any further.
Finally figured out a good strategy to Wizard Ward/Kill the metal slimes.
Step 1: Already had one mage with wizard ward, so changed the rest of my party to mages.
Step 2: Quickly leveled everyone up to 8 to get enough skill points so everyone learned Wizard Ward.
Step 3: Find the metal slime
Step 4: Everyone use wizard ward on the first turn and hope the slime didn't run away.
Step 5: Everyone attack slime, again hoping it wouldn't run away.
Success!
Before I spent like an hour trying to War Cry the slimes hoping they would be intimidated and would stick around. It never worked. But as soon as I put this plan into place, I was done in 20 min.
It's kinda fun coming up with strategies for these quests. The Whipping Boy one had to be the easiest tho. Had 2 members of my party with the skill, got rid of everyone else and just took them two into battle and kept having them use the skill on each other over and over. Got the quest done in one battle.
Step 1: Already had one mage with wizard ward, so changed the rest of my party to mages.
Step 2: Quickly leveled everyone up to 8 to get enough skill points so everyone learned Wizard Ward.
Step 3: Find the metal slime
Step 4: Everyone use wizard ward on the first turn and hope the slime didn't run away.
Step 5: Everyone attack slime, again hoping it wouldn't run away.
Success!
Before I spent like an hour trying to War Cry the slimes hoping they would be intimidated and would stick around. It never worked. But as soon as I put this plan into place, I was done in 20 min.
It's kinda fun coming up with strategies for these quests. The Whipping Boy one had to be the easiest tho. Had 2 members of my party with the skill, got rid of everyone else and just took them two into battle and kept having them use the skill on each other over and over. Got the quest done in one battle.
Dragona Akehi
Retired
Gravijah said:
Porth Llaffan.
Welsh you silly sods!
Lleviathan
Xevren said:
He is indeed amazing. I thought the fellow at Dourbridge was entertaining, and then I met this fellow.
Dragona Akehi
Retired
Bentendo said:
There is one guy in a town that you cannot possible miss.
How come everyone (from the pics people posted) have so awesome clothes/gears?
My characters all have very bad fashion styles...:lol Nothing match with anything and many of them are wearing the same items. Am I not doing it right and I am suppose to sacrifice power over fashion?
My characters all have very bad fashion styles...:lol Nothing match with anything and many of them are wearing the same items. Am I not doing it right and I am suppose to sacrifice power over fashion?
Dragona Akehi
Retired
seady said:
Vanity is a hell of a drug.
jgwhiteus said:
I'm about 12 hours in (just got my first fygg and I'm trying to get my boat), and I agree with a lot of what you say.
I am loving the translation. I've played Dragon Warrior/Quest since the first one, and this is the first in the entire series that seems to really "pop." Maybe it's because I love puns and DQ9 is overflowing with them. The regional accents in DQ9 are really well implemented so far. They aren't bad-bordering-illegible like DQ4 (bairns? really?) or attached only to specific characters for no apparent reason (Sanchez in DQ5).
I agree about the technical limitations. This game would've benefited from a few tweaks, like having the A button skip directly to the end of the dialog, or having some way to zoom. Yes the equipment affects your party, but your party members are rendered so small that the effect is difficult to appreciate outside the equipment screen. My biggest peeve is only one save slot. DQ has had 3 save lots for every single game--EVERY GAME--until this one. Why? Do the quests really take up that much memory? Is there really that much data to store that having multiple slots was impossible?
I got my wife hooked on DQ with DQ8 and she became a fan with DQ4 and 5 on the DS, but not being able to pass DQ9 back and forth is a real bummer. Sorry Nintendo, I'm not buying 2 copies.
sublime085
Member
I see I'm not the only one with an odd attachment to that silly stat.Instro said:
:lol
I just beat
I actually got ahead of myself and was leveling up in order to grind cash for the miracle sword, so he wasn't too hard. My martial artist did over 300 damage with one strike thanks to full tension and propeller blades, it was awesome.
This game is great, but sometimes the quests are a bit vague. Like for the martial artist quest, I have to use war cry and then kill five scarewolves. Easy, right? Well it's picky as shit, and you have to kill them more or less right after they're hit with the war cry. But sometimes war cry doesn't work, so you might accidentally kill them too early. Frustrating as hell.
And can anyone give me a tip on the
Garth Goyle at the Zere Rocks.
This game is great, but sometimes the quests are a bit vague. Like for the martial artist quest, I have to use war cry and then kill five scarewolves. Easy, right? Well it's picky as shit, and you have to kill them more or less right after they're hit with the war cry. But sometimes war cry doesn't work, so you might accidentally kill them too early. Frustrating as hell.
And can anyone give me a tip on the
cat quest? It just meowed at me, what the hell am I supposed to do?
Dragona Akehi
Retired
Hairband + Kitty Litter
RevenantKioku
PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS PEINS oh god i am drowning in them
This is a long scene.
Eteric Rice
Member
Question!
Is a Paladin more of a healer class or no? I turned my Warrior into a Paladin hoping for a boost in DPS, but the hammer seems to be a lot weaker then my (18500g) sword.
Should I make my priest the Paladin instead?
Is a Paladin more of a healer class or no? I turned my Warrior into a Paladin hoping for a boost in DPS, but the hammer seems to be a lot weaker then my (18500g) sword.
Should I make my priest the Paladin instead?
Eteric Rice
Member
Aeana said:
Do Paladins have heals? Because my priest takes care of heals atm.
Regulus Tera
Romanes Eunt Domus
Yaay only one fygg left!
Which means of course that I will spend the next ten hours power-leveling a martial artist-gone-gladiator before I manage to bother myself to continue with the story.
I'm in love.
Which means of course that I will spend the next ten hours power-leveling a martial artist-gone-gladiator before I manage to bother myself to continue with the story.
I'm in love.
Eteric Rice
Member
Aeana said:
Good heals, or just heal itself?
Regulus Tera
Romanes Eunt Domus
Eteric Rice said:
The best heal a Paladin gets is Midheal. On the other hand, they learn Kerplunk and Kamikazee.
Paladins are meant to be tanks, not healers.
Eteric Rice
Member
Regulus Tera said:
So I should just stick with my Priest, aye?
How would a team of Paladin, Priest, Gladiator, and Mage work? I'll probably make the Mage a Sage later on.
That party would be fine. Sage is a more healer-oriented class, due to the spells it learns, which is a shame since it gets so much MP. I liked it more in the earlier games since you can carry over mage spells to sage, but sage does at least learn the boom and zam spell lines, which is better than nothing.Eteric Rice said:
Eteric Rice
Member
Aeana said:
Ah, well I'll just keep my Mage then. Need something to do massive damage to more than 1 target.