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Etrian Odyssey Community Thread: The Ongoing Adventures of Fight and Heal

Zweizer

Banned
Thanks for the advice ill try a little bit more before with a front row TR before trying an AL/DH. I just wasnt sure how critical a strong bash dmg dealer was in this game and, in EO:U1 at least, axes are Landsknecht only.

You should be able to equip any weapon on any class as long as that character has a Grimoire skill of said weapon. That extends to other equipments as well (Shields on frailer classes)
 
(And a bonus DS game because I'm a cheat) The Dark Spire
(I'm assuming you don't have a regular DS here, ignore me if I'm wrong)
Enter The Dark Spire. Search for the Mage who rules it. It's oldschool and somewhat punishing, with descriptions that ooze character. I don't think I ever finished it, but I loved what I played and really should go back to it.
Atmospheric graphics or barebones wireframe, the choice is yours.

I wondered why I've never seen this before, then I saw it didn't come out in Europe. Might have to pick this up...
 

Zweizer

Banned
dj2owf-w0ae8buoidsw6.jpg
(Resemblances with certain folks here are purely coincidental, I assure!)

Finished about everything that could be done in the demo.

My current party held up nicely, though there definitely feels like there were some clashes. Fencer/Dragoon/Rover have pretty good synergy together, though I kinda regret making my Rover going down the Hound path for the sake of healing, as it comes at the price of less Chases.

Necromancer and Shaman definitely feel like mid-late game classes, as they are rather low on utility so far, but I do appreciate the Necromancer's ability to easily resummon more Wraiths. Too bad they somewhat struggle with summon slots with Dragoon and Rover, and would probably feel more at home in a party containing neither of the latter two, as they can use the Wraiths to both tank and heal. Shaman's buffs are nice, but with the scant amount of skills points allocated so far, find pretty much nothing else to do once the buffs are active. Giving them a bow kind of mitigate that, but it's still a rather limited class early-game.

Gonna grind up my 15 or so other characters now. Equipping the Memory Conch makes it really convenient.
 

autoduelist

Member
SNIP

You need a stylus. You get used to holding it.

SNIP

The New 2DSXL has the extra RAM and the little extra analogue stick thing but it doesn't have 3D screens.

SNIP
Disclaimer: It's possible (or even likely) that Etrian Odyssey V will unseat one of these, but it's not out yet and I only just started playing the demo so I can't really guarantee that yet.

So, my 4 recommendations:

SNIP

I recall that you like roguelikes, and I think I remember you picking up Shiren, so yeah, more Mystery Dungeons.

Thanks for this absolutely amazing post. It's extremely helpful, and... yeah, it's just great seeing someone go to this lengths to help someone out [in this case, me].

I need to ask some followup questions, but am out the door in 10... so I'll need to get back to those.

Quick thoughts... darn about the stylus. Hrm. I guess, as you say, I'll get used to it.

I own some of those already [on PSP], and didn't realize 7th Dragon wasn't a pure drpg [oh well, still sounds interesting]. I also completely forgot about SMT SJ [it's easy for me to forget 3ds games since I have never paid attention]. And I do love roguelikes! The harder the better, as long as they're fair.

I'm excited to get a 2/3DS... might not be til winter [depends on money]. I hear so much about Etrian, and I'm excited to dig in. I'm confused about story mode/classic mode [well, i understand the concept but am wondering how much is lost playing classic, since i don't care about story so much]. And SMT, of course... most of my favorite PS2 games have SMT in the title...
 
Maxed one party, on to my second using the classes I left behind before.
The Magic Conch is super cool but unfortunately not as useful when my benched characters are at max level for the demo. :(
 

Weebos

Banned
It's an accessory you can find in a chest in 3F. When equipped, everytime you gain Exp in battle, the characters not in the party gain a portion of that Exp as well. Pretty handy.

Awesome, I was wondering if they had something similar in this game.
 
It's an accessory you can find in a chest in 3F. When equipped, everytime you gain Exp in battle, the characters not in the party gain a portion of that Exp as well. Pretty handy.

That sure is nice. I can raise subs easier on the side.
unless this is a feature that's already existed in EO games and I've somehow missed it
 
Basically the only right way to draw maps is thus:

Water is not walled off, only walls are walled off. All water must be mapped with blue color. When applicable, transportation across gaps must be noted on the entry points and exit points of the transportation. If the gap is water, don't wall it off. If the gap is open air, it is acceptable to wall it off. Stairs are inclusive to the map, do not wall off the stairs completely. Doors have walls on two sides. Do not wall off the doors. For games without the harvesting icons, sparklies with annotations are the only acceptable way to map a harvesting point. Events are denoted with the E, with annotations if not a one-off, chests with the clover unless there is a chest icon (annotations with contents optional). The chests and events should not be walled off, and should be colored in underneath.

Color beneath stairs and doors. Locked doors have the closed door icon. If there is no closed door icon, coloring red or yellow underneath is also acceptable.

Damage squares are red and not walled off.

Shortcuts are denoted by walling off the entry and exit points, and using the applicable arrow. Do not fully wall off the arrow.

EO5 hype
 
Basically the only right way to draw maps is thus:

Water is not walled off, only walls are walled off. All water must be mapped with blue color. Stairs are inclusive to the map, do not wall off the stairs completely. Doors have walls on two sides. Do not wall off the doors. For games without the harvesting icons, sparklies with annotations are the only acceptable way to map a harvesting point. Events are denoted with the E, with annotations if not a one-off, chests with the clover (annotations with contents optional). The chests and events should not be walled off, and should be colored in underneath.

Color beneath stairs and doors. Locked doors have the closed door icon. If there is no closed door icon, coloring red or yellow underneath is also acceptable.

Damage squares are red and not walled off.

Shortcuts are denoted by walling off the entry and exit points, and using the applicable arrow. Do not fully wall off the arrow.

EO5 hype
Dammit, I was completely with you on mapping preferences until you said making a wall for a shortcut.
Mine always float free in the empty space.
95% match. :'(
 
Dammit, I was completely with you on mapping preferences until you said making a wall for a shortcut.
Mine always float free in the empty space.
95% match. :'(

The arrow should float in free space, except on the walls where you enter or exit. So yeah, the arrows float in empty space, it's just the walls on their entry and exit that are walled in.\

I think the only time I made water a color and not walls was in....4 I think in the one dungeon where you floated across the water.

Actually I don't follow....any of those rules.

HERETIC!

EDIT: yeah, see? The shortcut arrows are fine, you walled off the doors and stairs right, but you forgot to color them in. Your annotations are acceptable. The E adds clutter so there's wiggle room.
 

MrDoctor

Member
was testing an MHP | RN team in the demo. harbingers may be the weakest link, but could easily change with stronger enemies and more skills built up. necro is so weird i still don't know what to do with her; she definitely needs to make up for the lack of a proper healer.

i lean towards a purely offensive style, so i'd like to fit in a dragoon when the full game is out for the damage potential. i'll need to figure out elemental damage, as well.

also, nice to see you here, abstrusity
 
I honestly can't figure out what the deal is supposed to be with the icon setup in 5. I guess you're supposed to use the carrot icon for foraging spots? What's the circle for? Why does the palette stretch out so far to the left that there are four completely empty rows?
 

Zweizer

Banned
Basically the only right way to draw maps is thus:

Water is not walled off, only walls are walled off. All water must be mapped with blue color. When applicable, transportation across gaps must be noted on the entry points and exit points of the transportation. If the gap is water, don't wall it off. If the gap is open air, it is acceptable to wall it off. Stairs are inclusive to the map, do not wall off the stairs completely. Doors have walls on two sides. Do not wall off the doors. For games without the harvesting icons, sparklies with annotations are the only acceptable way to map a harvesting point. Events are denoted with the E, with annotations if not a one-off, chests with the clover unless there is a chest icon (annotations with contents optional). The chests and events should not be walled off, and should be colored in underneath.

Color beneath stairs and doors. Locked doors have the closed door icon. If there is no closed door icon, coloring red or yellow underneath is also acceptable.

Damage squares are red and not walled off.

Shortcuts are denoted by walling off the entry and exit points, and using the applicable arrow. Do not fully wall off the arrow.

EO5 hype

I only don't wall off water when there's actual proof that I can actually traverse it. Otherwise, it's too much of a bother. Same thing for the color under doors and stairs: too much of a bother.

I think the only time I made water a color and not walls was in....4 I think in the one dungeon where you floated across the water.

Actually I don't follow....any of those rules.

Oh wait I do.

Eww, so many annotations. Use the carrot and statue icons, pleb.

I honestly can't figure out what the deal is supposed to be with the icon setup in 5. I guess you're supposed to use the carrot icon for foraging spots? What's the circle for? Why does the palette stretch out so far to the left that there are four completely empty rows?

The carrot is what I use for gathering spots, yeah. I expect to use the circle for any future pitfall traps I stumble upon. I'm more sad that they replaced the sphere symbol for FOEs with a monster icon.
 

spiritfox

Member
I'm not sure if I want to keep Pugilist in my party since Rover can do the binding thing as well as him. Not sure what to replace him with though. I have the party to make use of Chain Fencer decently but I'm not sure if she does enough damage as a DPS class. Or I could go Masurao but 1 sword is meh and 4 swords is lol (and expensive to keep up).

Or I could keep Pugilist and have 2 bind classes but I'm not sure if that's ok.

Edit: Hmm Therians have shit luck though. I guess I'll keep Pugilist.

Edit2: Wait Rover binds mostly use the luck stat of the pet. Ughhhhhh.
 

Zweizer

Banned
At least Therians' luck isn't as bad as Brounis', lol.

Also, !bows and Guns' Atk is scaled off Str in this game, which is kind of a shame as I liked it being scaled off Agi.

Farming En is also pretty hard in this demo. Gathering Skill doesn't help much...
 
Farming En is also pretty hard in this demo. Gathering Skill doesn't help much...

I think the overall workings of the gathering mechanics are better this way than the old "spam the point, hope you don't get ambushed" system, but I don't feel like the volume of stuff you get is calibrated to it so it's just way less effective as a cash source.
 

Zweizer

Banned
I think the overall workings of the gathering mechanics are better this way than the old "spam the point, hope you don't get ambushed" system, but I don't feel like the volume of stuff you get is calibrated to it so it's just way less effective as a cash source.

I'd say the main problem is that all Gathering skills are single-point skills, so the only way to increase volume is to invest in these skills for every character instead of having a dedicated farmer, which is hard to do at the start of the game when you're still strapped for skill points, yet at the same time you're strapped for cash as well at this point of the game, lol.
 

Forward

Member
I'd say the main problem is that all Gathering skills are single-point skills, so the only way to increase volume is to invest in these skills for every character instead of having a dedicated farmer, which is hard to do at the start of the game when you're still strapped for skill points, yet at the same time you're strapped for cash as well at this point of the game, lol.

Farmers were a pretty godlike class, spawning from a pretty godlike sense of self-awareness, on the creators' part, were they not.
 

omlet

Member
Guess I need to see how viable that is in the long run. Demo seems to be cutting off the higher level part of the skill trees? I haven't looked at the skill build sim yet. Also, dodge tanking has never been that effective in EO... at least not for things that really need to be tanked...
 

spiritfox

Member
What does this mean

(Edit: all I did was make a few chars last night before bed, and now I'm at work)

Oh, I thought you knew about the specialization system.

Later on in the game you get to pick a specialization for each class. Advanced skills are locked behind them, and you can't pick skills from the branch you didn't pick.
 

omlet

Member
Oh, I just didn't know what 2nd names meant, I was thinking like character names lol

Late Edit: adding to the struggle is dragoon design is too good to not have in my party, too!
 
Completed the demo yesterday. Still not 100% on what I want my party to be. I know I like the idea behind Necro, and those ghosts put in a surprising amount of work early on. I also like chaining, limited though hit may be. Sadly, they two of them don't work together all that well. Working around that though, I was thinking of trying:

1 Sword Masuro/Chain Fencer
Dragoon / Spirit Summoning Necro / Shaman

The idea is to use the shaman to give everyone element, have the dragon force aggro to the Masuro and then use its counter attack. Necro puts open grave on Masuro to maximize the aggro draw's use. Of course, this relies on enemies making multiple physical attacks each turn, so the fencer can chain 2 + off the Masuro. Shaman will support with Oracle, and I guess make the Dragoon use Counter Guard and gun mount to lower the damage taken. Counter guard with an element should also allow a chain, and it will counter the same number of times as the Masuro.

This party is pretty tuned to fighting FOEs and bosses though. And again, it relies pretty heavily on the Masuro receiving multiple physical attacks in each turn. So I'm wondering if anyone knows how well the team would work later into the game. I'm still mulling over some other party comps to work with, since I'll be making a lot of other classes too anyway.
 

Zweizer

Banned
It was a bad idea for me to take a look at the later-game Names. I've now opened a can of worms with so many questions and theorycrafting floating in my head as to the most effective skills and specializations that would broadly fit my current party, with no way to test them.

It would seem that Shaman is the only class capable of reliably nullifying Elemental damage, and Harbinger the most reliable for preventing Binds/Ailments. Both require a previous buff as well.

I'm doubtful as to the long-term viability of Fencer's dodge-tanking as well, as later-game bosses tend to be geared against such 'cheap' tactics.

Thinking about swapping out my Necromancer for a Warlock, but
mass revive
will be hard to pass up.

I don't think I've been this conflicted about party-building since... II? So good job from Atlus on that regard.
 

omlet

Member
Same here. I've been looking at the skill sim site for like an hour, trying to piece the puzzle together lol. A lot of the individual pieces are familiar (like chasers, or how shaman is essentially a princess class, or how reaper has a lot in common with Nightseeker, a Warlock is the typical elemental mage class, etc.) but the mixture is new, and there seems to be a lot more potential for party synergy in places you wouldn't have seen it in prior games.

Also really curious to try out how necro works. I didn't make one in the demo yet but it seems like a neat class.
 
Necro and Poison Botanist are honestly way more fun than I thought they'd be.
The only character in my party not pulling their weight well yet is my Shaman. Her healing isn't needed much when my Rover can heal over time AND do burst HP and ailment heals.
Might switch her out when I trade my Earthlain Dragoon for a Brouni one.
 
Same here. I've been looking at the skill sim site for like an hour, trying to piece the puzzle together lol. A lot of the individual pieces are familiar (like chasers, or how shaman is essentially a princess class, or how reaper has a lot in common with Nightseeker, a Warlock is the typical elemental mage class, etc.) but the mixture is new, and there seems to be a lot more potential for party synergy in places you wouldn't have seen it in prior games.

Also really curious to try out how necro works. I didn't make one in the demo yet but it seems like a neat class.

I've been finding that a lot of the skill sets are more awkward in EO5 the more I looking into them. Some specializations have skills that really belong on the other branch. For example, while I think the Fencer is the most divided class, even it has some problems. Chain fencer gets Sylph Screen and speed boost, both arguably better on the dodge fencer, though I think both should have speed boost.

Dragoon has Gun Revenge on the Cannon specialization, but that kind of skill makes much more sense on the guard side, where you will be using guards and gun mount more. Its a skill that encourages guarding, on a specialization that really wants to be shooting all of the time.

I think the Reaper is the biggest offender, with the debuff spec being able to much better use Endless Shroud, which it doesn't need anywhere near as much as the Ailment spec.

As for Necro... I'm not sure really. It feels like a class that kind of loses its direction once specialized. Its base kit is actually super good for support, but neither side effectively builds on that, instead trying to be a lot more offensive. I don't think a team revive is a good skill when it has a 75% chance at best of working, and the cost for blowing up zombies comes off a bit flat on the sacrifice line. Open Grave and Ghost dance have potential. I just kind of wish Necro was more like Hexer, since that is clearly where the inspiration comes from. I really do like the class, and as I posted above I am trying to work one in. Though ideally it is a Sanzu class. Run it with Ghost Dance along with a One-Two Puncher to max out the chases before the enemy moves to avoid your team from getting hit.
 

omlet

Member
I think the Reaper is the biggest offender, with the debuff spec being able to much better use Endless Shroud, which it doesn't need anywhere near as much as the Ailment spec.

I wonder if part of it is based on the idea of running multiple of the same class in your party, with different specializations.
 

Zweizer

Banned
I wonder if part of it is based on the idea of running multiple of the same class in your party, with different specializations.

Yeah it really feels like the name is encouraging you to create several versions of the same class with the way the Names system is set up. Guess the Memory Conch isn't there just out of a fit of developer generosity.
 
I wonder if part of it is based on the idea of running multiple of the same class in your party, with different specializations.

The examples I listed only work if the unit is meeting the condition based on what info I've seen on them. So a debuff Reaper can't proc Endless Shroud for an ailment Reaper. In that case, it doesn't really help if you run both, since the wrong reaper will be getting Miasma up all the time.

Like, if a Dragoon's Gun Revenge activated when any guard skill is triggered, it would be pretty awesome. I mean, I guess you could by running a shield Dragoon who protects a row and using Gun Mount on a cannon Dragoon on the same turn. Donno if you can have multiple shield up at once though. If you can, you could easily keep a full guard going using 2 units and hopefully get some decent stacks up.
 

spiritfox

Member
I want to use ailment Harbinger but their skills seem all over the place. They want to keep miasma up as long as possible to keep up Black Blade but Endless Shroud is a dead end for them and they won't be spending turns using debuffs outside of Feeble Miasma. They could spend the last turn on Shroud of Reality and then reapply a new miasma but they waste a turn and resets their BB count. Ugh. This seems poorly thought out.
 

asagami_

Banned
The tried and true method of suckering a new adventurer into your guild, stealing and selling their starting equipment, and then throwing them out!

Hahaha I love do this. I see it as a safe-way method in the case you need money to go to the inn.
 

omlet

Member
I want to use ailment Harbinger but their skills seem all over the place. They want to keep miasma up as long as possible to keep up Black Blade but Endless Shroud is a dead end for them and they won't be spending turns using debuffs outside of Feeble Miasma. They could spend the last turn on Shroud of Reality and then reapply a new miasma but they waste a turn and resets their BB count. Ugh. This seems poorly thought out.

I dunno, with Endless Shroud it seems like the idea is that you wouldn't "waste" a turn because by then you may need to reapply a debuff which could proc Misama again. I'm just guessing based on the skill sim. Real effectiveness won't become clear until we've got the full game available and have enough skill points to flesh out real builds.
 
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