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Tales of Graces ƒ |OT| Gracing the PS3 with the Best RPG Combat

Neki

Member
still can't get to the paralysis monster in the final dungeon. I looked up a walkthrough and they walk across a bridge, but I totally don't have it in mine and I have no idea where it came from

edit: found it, derp.
 
Done all inn requests and grinding eleth mixer now... went from 3700 ish to 7101 today, will do the rest* tomorrow.

*to ~9000, then it's time for NG+
 

kewlmyc

Member
Done all inn requests and grinding eleth mixer now... went from 3700 ish to 7101 today, will do the rest* tomorrow.

*to ~9000, then it's time for NG+

Damn, how did you raise it so fast? What do you use?

Also grinding for the doll parts in f arc is a pain in the ass.
 
Damn, how did you raise it so fast? What do you use?

Also grinding for the doll parts in f arc is a pain in the ass.

Miso Stew brings it up by 5 every time with book of potential and book of growth, with book of frugality to reduce the eleth cost. I also have Beef with Red Wine Sauce for when it goes under 50%, but that only brings it up by 3 every time, but hey, +1 to armor every time as well...

Doing it on North Barona Road with the two enemy spawns right next to where a Turtlez is standing. Each battle lasts under 5 seconds.

It DID take me about 3 hours of non-stop grinding to raise it that high, so I'm not sure I'd call that "fast". It's not too bad, though.

Yes, grinding for the doll parts IS a pain! Make sure you have food in the mixer that increases material drops, and equip titles like Asbel's "Lord of Loot" to increase drop rates as well
 

scy

Member
Also grinding for the doll parts in f arc is a pain in the ass.

Loot titles, +Drop Rate Food, Book of Gathering, etc. I got the materials for 15 of each doll long before I got the Soul Orbs from the enemies :/

Miso Stew brings it up by 5 every time with book of potential and book of growth, with book of frugality to reduce the eleth cost. I also have Beef with Red Wine Sauce for when it goes under 50%, but that only brings it up by 3 every time, but hey, +1 to armor every time as well...

Don't forget Book of Satiation and two in-battle foods! Crab Fried Rice and Fried Manju (>10s, >20s activations)! Though, with the whole 5s fights, I wager this isn't really going to help all that much.

Seriously, just use those foods always in the Mixer. Maybe not the Fried Manju one with the Book of Satiation but Crab Fried Rice + Miso Stew (Rice Omelette for early game when you don't have the Miso Stew option) will get you to the upper thousands as part of the main game easily.
 
I bought the Cameo costumes for Sophie and Pascal... I feel dirty.

How can I get the Yuri and Rita costumes? I heard I can play a card game or something.
 

kewlmyc

Member
I bought the Cameo costumes for Sophie and Pascal... I feel dirty.

How can I get the Yuri and Rita costumes? I heard I can play a card game or something.

You have to collect Magic Cartas throughout the game. Then head to Sable Izolle and talk to the guy with the smile above his head. You have to play a card matching game with him, matching the quotes on the cards with the pictures on the cards. If you beat him in each difficulty without having him get a single point you win a costume. Easy (10 cards) gets you Asbel's Yuri costume, Medium (20 cards) gets you Sophie's Patty costume, and Hard (25 cards) gets you Cheria's Rita costume.

Hard mode is super hard because the AI likes to cheat in it, so a helpful tip is to constantly pause the game during the middle of the match as you move to the card you need.
 
OH.MY.GOD!!!!!!!!

The last freaking dungeon in the F arc ( Lastalia Shaft ) is SO FREAKING CONFUSING :\

WHAT.THE.HELL?

Have been walking around for the last TWO HOURS and can't get to anywhere!!!!

I keep using the floating platform to get to the other floors... I get to floor 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 then NOTHING and I warp back right at the start.....

I HATE THIS :\
 
OH.MY.GOD!!!!!!!!

The last freaking dungeon in the F arc ( Lastalia Shaft ) is SO FREAKING CONFUSING :\

WHAT.THE.HELL?

Have been walking around for the last TWO HOURS and can't get to anywhere!!!!

I keep using the floating platform to get to the other floors... I get to floor 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 then NOTHING and I warp back right at the start.....

I HATE THIS :\

It's really only that first area that is confusing, once you get past it the rest is very easy and short.
 
Well.... the first area feels like ETERNITY ;_;

Going to take few hours of break, because it really PISSED ME OFF.

The dungeon mostly tries to trick you, if you get confused as to where you are then it's incredibly difficult, if you are careful to know where you have/haven't been it's not too difficult.
 

ULTROS!

People seem to like me because I am polite and I am rarely late. I like to eat ice cream and I really enjoy a nice pair of slacks.
the fuck?! do I really have to fight
Veigue, Reala and Kohak
solo? this is bs!

It's not that bad.
Reala, who's pretty hard on Zhonecage, has been botched down
. On easy, they're all level 80.

I still can't get over
Reala being the hardest among them all... Not to mention being a tank enemy
.

Edit:
Sorry, I thought as a group. They're easy as individuals except for Reala.
 

Datschge

Member
What are the differences between ToI DS and ToIR?

Sorry, been busy and only seeing now that nobody answered this.

The biggest change imo is that ToI's Style system allowed any character to turn into powerful spell casters, among four other styles. In a way it's like Graces' title system mixed with a simple job system. Besides gaining set Artes at specific levels the chosen Style decides which passive attributes get additional boosts at specific levels. ToIR dropped that subsystem altogether in favor of that newly added spell caster character. But really, if the story (down to the text) and characters wouldn't be mostly the same they could easily be different unrelated games.
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
Loot titles, +Drop Rate Food, Book of Gathering, etc. I got the materials for 15 of each doll long before I got the Soul Orbs from the enemies :/
Me too. The materials have been easier to get on this playthrough since I have a better idea of what to do (and I've been making a point to attempt to steal them in general, so I don't always wait for them to drop). I've only been through Future Arc once before so it's quite a refresher.

Sorry, been busy and only seeing now that nobody answered this.

The biggest change imo is that ToI's Style system allowed any character to turn into powerful spell casters, among four other styles. In a way it's like Graces' title system mixed with a simple job system. Besides gaining set Artes at specific levels the chosen Style decides which passive attributes get additional boosts at specific levels. ToIR dropped that subsystem altogether in favor of that newly added spell caster character. But really, if the story (down to the text) and characters wouldn't be mostly the same they could easily be different unrelated games.
Thank you for taking the time to answer this. :)

Dropping the Style system seems so strange. I didn't mind the Style system in the original, and thought it was pretty useful. But I didn't like the guild dungeons at all in Innocence, so I didn't really want to import this Day 1 (or whenever I got my Vita, whatever) because I wasn't super-keen some of the stuff the original Innocence had to offer (ex: guild dungeons, lack of balancing, etc.)

I did hear that some of the bosses in Innocence R break out of combos a la Xillia/Hearts, which is unfortunate since it seems like there's a 200 hit trophy.

The reason I asked was because I've been considering importing it and I haven't seen a lot of impressions on GAF for it. I thought the demo wasn't too bad. Trophy list seems... interesting. Harder than Graces' and Xillia's, but not as difficult as Vesperia's (or it might be on-par, ymmv; especially since there's a 'low level clear', 'get to max level', etc), from what I can see.

Solo fights in graces is nothing compared to Xillia's.
But Jude don't care about TP! And you can get whatever armour or weapon whenever you want to compensate for any shortages of damage you feel like you have. :lol

And Milla can combo things herself without breaking the combo at all (I posted a few videos of this in the Xillia thread, and they're hilarrrrioussss). Unless we're talking bosses where they operate under the Tales of Hearts "break out of your combo after not a lot of hits" thing. But you can get around that in both Mania and Unknown if you wanted to.
 

kewlmyc

Member
Miso Stew brings it up by 5 every time with book of potential and book of growth, with book of frugality to reduce the eleth cost. I also have Beef with Red Wine Sauce for when it goes under 50%, but that only brings it up by 3 every time, but hey, +1 to armor every time as well...

Doing it on North Barona Road with the two enemy spawns right next to where a Turtlez is standing. Each battle lasts under 5 seconds.

It DID take me about 3 hours of non-stop grinding to raise it that high, so I'm not sure I'd call that "fast". It's not too bad, though.

Yes, grinding for the doll parts IS a pain! Make sure you have food in the mixer that increases material drops, and equip titles like Asbel's "Lord of Loot" to increase drop rates as well
Loot titles, +Drop Rate Food, Book of Gathering, etc. I got the materials for 15 of each doll long before I got the Soul Orbs from the enemies :/



Don't forget Book of Satiation and two in-battle foods! Crab Fried Rice and Fried Manju (>10s, >20s activations)! Though, with the whole 5s fights, I wager this isn't really going to help all that much.

Seriously, just use those foods always in the Mixer. Maybe not the Fried Manju one with the Book of Satiation but Crab Fried Rice + Miso Stew (Rice Omelette for early game when you don't have the Miso Stew option) will get you to the upper thousands as part of the main game easily.

Thanks for the tips guys, you are lifesavers. In the matter of two hours, I managed to get all the materials thanks to your tips.
 

Datschge

Member
I did hear that some of the bosses in Innocence R break out of combos a la Xillia/Hearts, which is unfortunate since it seems like there's a 200 hit trophy.

ToIR developer 7th Chord appears to be heavily influenced by Hearts. Unfortunately besides Hidenori Yamauchi being supervisor on Keroro RPG (7th Chord's first Tales alike game, like a simpler Hearts) I have not found any NTS staff credited.

I should've clarified. I meant using milla against a particular boss ..... That shit was just stupid.

I was laughing because your statement was true and it's funny since Soloing in Xillia is so broken by design.
 
Just got the game today.

Started the game on Hard before I was used to the battle system and almost died in my very first battle! Against 2 Wolf Pups. Very sad, but I'm getting the hang of it.
 

Sagitario

Member
Sorry, been busy and only seeing now that nobody answered this.

The biggest change imo is that ToI's Style system allowed any character to turn into powerful spell casters, among four other styles. In a way it's like Graces' title system mixed with a simple job system. Besides gaining set Artes at specific levels the chosen Style decides which passive attributes get additional boosts at specific levels. ToIR dropped that subsystem altogether in favor of that newly added spell caster character. But really, if the story (down to the text) and characters wouldn't be mostly the same they could easily be different unrelated games.


That's too bad, cause ToI systems had good things going on (an improvement over that would have been great)... and to be honest, I didn't really care for the story nor characters.
How is DI-LMBS compared to DS-LMBS? Typical Sypmhonia-like LMBS?
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
Man, I should be studying, but I guess I just want to get Future Arc done and out of the way tonight so I can go back to the game at the end of next week to do the postgame content.

Just have a few of those extra skits to go (ie: the ones that come up when you reach the bottom of the F arc final dungeon), and then I'll beat the boss. If I miss anything (ex: 60 seconds trophy), I could always replay the arc to get whatever later on. As long as I have a few Narikiri dolls for a few chosen characters for the Zone Cage boss, I'm all good.

The final F Arc dungeon wasn't as bad as I'd remembered it. I hated it when I did it on my JP playthrough, but it went better this time around.

Just got the game today.

Started the game on Hard before I was used to the battle system and almost died in my very first battle! Against 2 Wolf Pups. Very sad, but I'm getting the hang of it.
Aw. Try Moderate and work your way up. You'll get the hang of it. You can't really take advantage of the system in its fullest earlier on because you don't have the ability to style-shift yet, nor do the kids have the cooler Artes. It's probably best to get through that part quickly and get the better stuff to experience the system in its full glory, imo.

ToIR developer 7th Chord appears to be heavily influenced by Hearts. Unfortunately besides Hidenori Yamauchi being supervisor on Keroro RPG (7th Chord's first Tales alike game, like a simpler Hearts) I have not found any NTS staff credited.
Oh, they were the same people who did Keroro RPG? I guess that ToIR would share more similarities with that (albeit not as simple) than other Tales games, then. I haven't played Keroro in a while, but I was surprised that it played so much like Hearts in the first place, as opposed to maybe Phantasia or the OG Destiny. >.>
 

kayos90

Tragic victim of fan death
I was laughing because your statement was true and it's funny since Soloing in Xillia is so broken by design.

Jude solo is broken period. He's one of the characters that are fundamentally broken at its core. At least for Yuri it was due to Overlimit. For Jude, it's all on him. Oh man....
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
That's too bad, cause ToI systems had good things going on (an improvement over that would have been great)... and to be honest, I didn't really care for the story nor characters.
How is DI-LMBS compared to DS-LMBS? Typical Sypmhonia-like LMBS?
That's a good question. I should've asked that too. :lol Datschge'll likely come to clarify.

From what I gathered, the system itself with regards to comboing and aerials is pretty much the same as the original. But you have the Rave System now, which you build up when you attack (and gets depleted when you get attacked). It has four levels (and maintaining it to level 4 is apparently annoying from what I hear since you can't get hit while continuing to attack the enemy, basically). The rave abilities seem to be just stat boosts or passive abilities, I think (ex: HP regeneration, P.Atk% up, etc).

The demo doesn't really let you do much, though. It's really short. :/

From what I hear, it's terribly mediocre in general, yet an improvement upon the original.

Jude solo is broken period. He's one of the characters that are fundamentally broken at its core. At least for Yuri it was due to Overlimit. For Jude, it's all on him. Oh man....
I knew there was a reason why I liked Jude prior to Xillia's release! He's probably the most fun MA character I've handled in the series. Though it's too bad, well, you know my gripes with him already.
 

Sagitario

Member
Just have a few of those extra skits to go (ie: the ones that come up when you reach the bottom of the F arc final dungeon), and then I'll beat the boss. If I miss anything (ex: 60 seconds trophy), I could always replay the arc to get whatever later on. As long as I have a few Narikiri dolls for a few chosen characters for the Zone Cage boss, I'm all good.

What's the deal with that dungeon and those dolls?
Also, do you have to replay the whole ƒ arc to retry the boss?

If you start the ƒ arc, you can't go back to the main game until you finish it? The ƒ arc can be done an infinite number of times?
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
What's the deal with that dungeon and those dolls?
The Narikiri dolls allow you to
turn the character with the title costume mastered as a skill just like regular costumes into another character. So basically you can have Hubert turn into Asbel if he has the title for it. I personally like having doubling or tripling up on Cherias, Asbels, or Huberts in the party whenever I feel like I'm going to have a tough time or if I want to get higher combos for something. The final boss of the Zone Cage is quite hard on higher difficulties so I generally prefer to have a few of the same party members around.

Also, do you have to replay the whole ƒ arc to retry the boss?
You need to replay the entire future arc again to get to the future arc boss again, and to get back to the main game again with your new loot. Yeah, it's a little cumbersome. :/

Of course, if you want to get the 60 seconds trophy for the future arc final boss in one go, you could always reset or something if you didn't get it.

If you start the ƒ arc, you can't go back to the main game until you finish it? The ƒ arc can be done an infinite number of times?
If you start the future arc and not save over your main game clear file with a future arc save, you can always use your clear save from the main game to just do the postgame content without the future arc bonuses like Accel Mode, blast calibers, etc.

If you want to go back to the main game with Accel Mode, the fourth blast calibers, and whatever else you earned during future arc, you'll have to beat the future final boss so you can go back to the main game with those future arc things by loading the future arc clear save.

And yep, Future Arc can be replayed as many times as you want.
 

kayos90

Tragic victim of fan death
I knew there was a reason why I liked Jude prior to Xillia's release! He's probably the most fun MA character I've handled in the series. Though it's too bad, well, you know my gripes with him already.

We both dislike him for the same reason. Ugh.... So bad....
 

Kinitari

Black Canada Mafia
Just got the game, I've played pretty much every other tales game (not Xillia) - so I know what to expect roughly - anything I should keep an eye out for in the beginning?
 

Dark Schala

Eloquent Princess
Just got the game, I've played pretty much every other tales game (not Xillia) - so I know what to expect roughly - anything I should keep an eye out for in the beginning?
If you think something's going to be a discovery, see if it'll prompt you (ex: the apple tree, the picture and the windmill in the childhood arc), and you should get a skit that accompanies the discovery somewhere (in the case of the windmill, you have to climb up and run a little bit in there to get the skit).

Talk to NPCs for food in the Childhood Arc. Also, remember to loot people's houses for free stuff.

There are some subevents which may or may not be recorded in your sidequest book, so check around for event stars or smiley faces on top of people's heads before you move onto the next objective.

Dualize your heart out! Getting used to dualization early will help you out immensely when it's truly time to dualize for the inn requests or something. The links in this post will help you with finding shards to dualize weapons/armour with. Scy has been kind enough to detail how to dualize weapons for profit, and also to outline what to use in the Eleth Mixer to boost its capacity. I used the nearly same items when I played the JP version and it definitely works quickly. Cooking is your friend and it makes healing and getting stuff much easier since you have something automated on a gambit-like system working for you during battle.

If you feel like the game's too easy, or you're doing the same combos over and over, maybe try nudging the the difficulty up and see if that makes the difference. Exploiting enemy weaknesses via your A-Artes and/or your B-Artes can make the difference between life or death, CC boosts, and comboing on higher difficulties. And around-step is your friend. Don't forget that you can escape battles by making the character run against the battle arena's boundary (only if it's coloured blue; if red, you cannot escape) to fill up a gauge to escape.

I wrote up a small short post about the basics of A-Artes combat here. Not sure if it's helpful, but it's the basics of the basics when it comes down to exploiting enemy weakness on a consistent basis.

You might feel like you have to adjust AI during battle if they're not doing what you want. Go ahead and do it, or you may manually take control of them by using the D-pad to quickly switch characters or go into the Artes menu to tell them which spells to cast/abilities to use.

The Google Doc we linked in the OP is helpful for checking around for the subevents, including the missable ones, like the Handkerchief event which you must do sometime between the end of Chapter 4 and before you enter the final dungeon (to be safe--I heard it's the final floor, but I just do it asap so I don't have to worry about it) otherwise you'll miss it permanently. There will very likely be FAQs out there for this game now, so you could use those to your advantage as opposed to the doc we linked in the OP. Nothing important like artes or quests are missable outside of that handkerchief quest, so it isn't like Abyss.

Feed the cats fish in every town you're in so you don't have to go back and do it all at the end of the game.

Edit: Wait. Even though it's in the OP... 200 battles on Hard to unlock Evil difficulty; 300 battles on Evil to unlock Chaos.

I think that's about it.

We both dislike him for the same reason. Ugh.... So bad....
I don't dislike Jude in general, but (I'll try to be as vague as possible here)
when he behaves in that particular manner, well, I feel a little disappointed that he doesn't have the core and distinct personality traits to set him apart from those certain instances where I don't like him much (though you could argue that his intelligence, quick thinking and martial arts skills could be used to define his character somewhat).
 

kayos90

Tragic victim of fan death
I don't dislike Jude in general, but (I'll try to be as vague as possible here)
when he behaves in that particular manner, well, I feel a little disappointed that he doesn't have the core and distinct personality traits to set him apart from those certain instances where I don't like him much (though you could argue that his intelligence, quick thinking and martial arts skills could be used to define his character somewhat).

Only one word is needed to describe Jude.
MILLA!!!!!!
That's it. It was the most disappointing thing ever.

Milla definitely is one of the more... alluring female character Tales has seen in a while but still... Anyway, he's fine only when Milla is not concerned.
 
I don't understand how Japanese games from 10 years ago are dirt cheap in comparison with overpriced NA copies, but Tales of Vesperia PS3 is getting more expensive.

Thanks for your input everyone.
 
Just fought the Gentleman on Chaos. Wow, what a... chaotic... 12 and a half minute fight. Hooray for 1099186 EXP!

edit: lol
Lambda Theos
on Chaos is kind of ridiculous, I turned it down to hard. On to NG+ finally
 

Sagitario

Member
The Narikiri dolls allow you to
turn the character with the title costume mastered as a skill just like regular costumes into another character. So basically you can have Hubert turn into Asbel if he has the title for it. I personally like having doubling or tripling up on Cherias, Asbels, or Huberts in the party whenever I feel like I'm going to have a tough time or if I want to get higher combos for something. The final boss of the Zone Cage is quite hard on higher difficulties so I generally prefer to have a few of the same party members around.

You need to replay the entire future arc again to get to the future arc boss again, and to get back to the main game again with your new loot. Yeah, it's a little cumbersome. :/

Of course, if you want to get the 60 seconds trophy for the future arc final boss in one go, you could always reset or something if you didn't get it.

If you start the future arc and not save over your main game clear file with a future arc save, you can always use your clear save from the main game to just do the postgame content without the future arc bonuses like Accel Mode, blast calibers, etc.

If you want to go back to the main game with Accel Mode, the fourth blast calibers, and whatever else you earned during future arc, you'll have to beat the future final boss so you can go back to the main game with those future arc things by loading the future arc clear save.

And yep, Future Arc can be replayed as many times as you want.

Thanks :)
Having 2 Cherias or 2 Maliks sounds awesome!
So, getting the materials to dualize the dolls is the hard part?


I took a 5 days break from the game, I was playing it around +6 hours daily so I got kind of exhausted, but I will continue where I left tomorrow (about to leave Fodra).

I only have like 250K gald (I spent a lot of money to get the stamps for miso), so I guess I will start worrying about shard drops again D: >_< (I understand the process, but still overwhelms me a bit... specially getting the right qualities)

Is the Rare equipment the best in the game? I am thinking of finalizing my party armor/weapons/accessories/etc.
 

Jucksalbe

Banned
A very boring first 4 hours. The childhood arc is boring as hell.
Childhood arc makes this game like a B to a B-.
If you're not skipping the childhood arc every playthrough, you hate freedom!
What's everyone's problem with the childhood arc? I loved that part and actually thought its biggest fault is that it's too short. It has a severely dumbed battle system, but it's at the beginning of the game, so I didn't mind.
 

Koroviev

Member
What's everyone's problem with the childhood arc? I loved that part and actually thought its biggest fault is that it's too short. It has a severely dumbed battle system, but it's at the beginning of the game, so I didn't mind.

The combat is weak, but childhood ark is very fleeting. I think I finished in four hours or less.
 
Child Cheria justifies the existence of the childhood arc. She sold the hell out of that "sickly girl who needs friends" thing to where I just wanted to hug her the whole time. XD

As for the "which Tales is better" argument, my personal favorite is Vesperia, but as long as you don't say Tempest or Legendia you're okay in my book.
 

ULTROS!

People seem to like me because I am polite and I am rarely late. I like to eat ice cream and I really enjoy a nice pair of slacks.
I finished childhood arc in 10 hours. ._.
 
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