Really looking forward to this as well as RS3 but I just don't have the cash for either one right now. Sucks because I want to support this sort of stuff. I'll check out sales circa February or March
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SaGa Scarlet Grace Ambitions |OT| So Good It Sells Itself
- Thread starter Gu4n
- Start date
The other... interface? I must peruse the menu options. You mean classic mode? I never thought anything about it, thanks for the tip!
So I'm playing as Lurpina and went to the second area down south. Is that correct? I was supposed to go north but then I spoke to a guy in one of the villages and it automatically went into a boat to the south
That's normal. I'm not sure if the game branches slightly there but there's a bunch of different ways to tackle stuff.
Yeah I meant classic mode. It isn't as pretty but I think the font is bigger.
Okay so I'm at the volcano area in Urpina's quest. Some questions:
1. I got Kahn from the old lady, is there any penalty for taking her main guard away from her, or is this just another way to get a new character?
2. Is this whole volcano/sluice gate/hotsprings stuff a sidequest? Should I do that now or...
3. I have to go northeast to fix the broken Saw. Should I do that immediately, or should I do stuff around this volcano area first?
2. Is this whole volcano/sluice gate/hotsprings stuff a sidequest? Should I do that now or...
3. I have to go northeast to fix the broken Saw. Should I do that immediately, or should I do stuff around this volcano area first?
There's a tower in second region called Astel iirc. Go there and finish the battle then reenter again to get option to recruit the priest. She's a mage with 2 healing spells learned.
The volcano gives one of the 5 elemental weapons you can reforge into different type. You can do it now. Repairing the saw will make the story progress.
Activating springs and saving the sea creature lowers the eruption levels while doing the steam geyser increase it. After you increase the pressure enough there will be a lava flow and a boss.
So far I've activated all three springs, did not fight any battles at the rocks yet. Should I just start fighting the battles at the rocks?
What do the sluice gates do?
And separately, going through the third sluice gate led me to a snow area where if I fight battles, ice blocks form around a polar bear. Do I just keep fighting these battles and try to form a path for him or something?
Okay, so Aeana keeps pushing this game on Twitter and Wario just posted that 30% deal on GMG, so I am interested. Plus it seems like the response in this thread has been mostly positive. I've read the caveats in the OP and I don't think the lack of traditional towns or dungeons bothers me (I take it that basically means all battles are on the overworld? Seems totally fine to me!). I do have a few questions, though:
1) Do I need to know anything about the SaGa series at all if I wanted to start here? I'm guessing yes because hey the last game was released in 2002, but one can never be too certain.
2) I don't think I read any obvious problems with the PC version but... any problems with the PC version? I'm open to other platforms but 30% with no tax is pretty good.
3) Read the last few posts where PlanetSmasher feels like they're stuck in a hole they can't get out of, difficulty-wise. This is the sort of thing that made me really paranoid to play Final Fantasy Tactics, since I heard that grinding in that game actually makes your situation worse. The OP did have a note about how to grind effectively, which helps alleviate my fears, but as someone who's never played a SaGa game before is this a common situation where you've played all the Easy encounters, screwed them up somehow, and thus can't survive any of the battles you DO have access to?
I suppose I could also just wait for the game to get cheaper. Decisions like this are how I end up with a backlog that's out of control, lol.
1) Do I need to know anything about the SaGa series at all if I wanted to start here? I'm guessing yes because hey the last game was released in 2002, but one can never be too certain.
2) I don't think I read any obvious problems with the PC version but... any problems with the PC version? I'm open to other platforms but 30% with no tax is pretty good.
3) Read the last few posts where PlanetSmasher feels like they're stuck in a hole they can't get out of, difficulty-wise. This is the sort of thing that made me really paranoid to play Final Fantasy Tactics, since I heard that grinding in that game actually makes your situation worse. The OP did have a note about how to grind effectively, which helps alleviate my fears, but as someone who's never played a SaGa game before is this a common situation where you've played all the Easy encounters, screwed them up somehow, and thus can't survive any of the battles you DO have access to?
I suppose I could also just wait for the game to get cheaper. Decisions like this are how I end up with a backlog that's out of control, lol.
Started running into roadblocks around the 4th / 5th areas / provinces of Urpina's route. They more or less have the same layout in that there are 3 elemental mine spots you can endlessly replay to grind resources or skill / hp ups and a few elemental smithy towns and 1-2 "Hard" story encounters that have ultimately led to me just dropping the difficulty to get past because I can't return to any previous areas and I'm tired of grinding the mines because I desperately need Natura and Aes and not more Terra Unda or Ignis.
For the SaGa initiated I'm not sure Urpina is the best first choice here because of the early linearity. And the focus on grinding is a bit odd given how opinionated the other SaGa games have been about "punishing" it. I'm loving the battle systems even more than usual, but the boundaries are putting me off.
For the SaGa initiated I'm not sure Urpina is the best first choice here because of the early linearity. And the focus on grinding is a bit odd given how opinionated the other SaGa games have been about "punishing" it. I'm loving the battle systems even more than usual, but the boundaries are putting me off.
(1) You can start here without issue. Doesn't require knowledge of any other SaGa games.
(2) YMMV. PC version definitely seems to have the most issues (haven't heard about any at all from other versions), both small and large, but people have also reported no issues with it.
(3) There's no reason to be paranoid. PlanetSmasher just needed to learn the ropes a bit. The battle system can take slight investment to "click," but once it does it's really enjoyable. As is often the case, you have the fewest tools at your disposal to engage creatively with the combat at the start of the game.
Virtually no chance you screw up your file. There are difficulty settings (Easy/Normal/Hard), so you can freely adjust it downward and back if you need to acclimate or are desperate to beat a tough encounter. Also, BR going up isn't necessarily bad... stronger enemies means better rewards, which means your party is getting stronger and you can craft their equipment higher.
None of those concerns are an issue.
- No plot or character relations, the battle system is different, and most of the mechanics are different. Incremental HP gain, skill levels, and sparking are similar to some previous games, but there's a lot to learn regardless.
- All of the versions released last week are good. Complaints are generally kind of slight. But the PS4/Switch/XBox/Phone versions are 20% off as-is, so $3 isn't really worth changing the platform you play on.
- There's no way to screw yourself in this game. You are never locked into a fight like you could be in FFT. There's almost always a wide variety of encounters to poke against. Planet Smasher was just adamantly ignoring advice and refusing to turn down the difficulty. I guarantee that any of the SaGa veterans here would be able to dig them out of their hole. Blacksmith rank going up as you Blacksmith makes lower-tier upgrades virtually free, so the rising max basically drags up all of your much lower gear to a decent level.
How much cheaper do you think the game is going to get? $21 for a brand new open-world RPG.
Oh, tbh it's not the price that I'm concerned about, more like will I really be able to devote the time to this game now when I'm still in the middle of Pokemon and Death Stranding, and if I'm not, might as well wait for a lower price.
I read more of the thread and it sounds like a couple of people have reported major crashing issues on Steam, which worries me a bit, but it's hard to get a sense with so few players if this is a super common issue or if there is a potential workaround or whatever. Looking at the Discord it sounds like other people have had next to no issues. Thinking about it...
Anyhow, with regards to difficulty, the boss of Leonard's path is totally ridiculously hard.
Is higher BR actually the answer here? 450 is too low? I felt like my lower BR/HP attempts went way better than these mid/late game attempts.
EDIT: I have some ideas and pretty sure I figured it out:
- Moves faster than most of the party even with the "Fast" formation (Free For All)
- Acts with an AoE stun or AoE confusion in the first phase.
- Acts every single turn with a AoE counter in the second phase that can't be quelled and will use the AoE spell even if you don't attack at all during the turn.
- Difficulty level doesn't change its strength at all?
- Seems to indeed scale with BR
- Defend/Pass doesn't seem to reduce the damage from the AoE attacks at all.
Is higher BR actually the answer here? 450 is too low? I felt like my lower BR/HP attempts went way better than these mid/late game attempts.
EDIT: I have some ideas and pretty sure I figured it out:
More areas opened in the final area that correspond to the moves. Beat the side bosses, remove the moves from Phase 1. Not sure how it plays into Phase Two, though.
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The sluice gates is to help the trapped sea monster escape. Kill all the fiend symbols then open the gate so the creature can escape. You get crystals for that.
The rock will eventually trigger the eruption so yes.
Let's check the wiki for advice!
...oh.
(It looks like decisions you made during he game alter the final boss's strength, so...)
I would note that even though there are difficulty options that Easy is by no means a 2019 definition of Easy. It's more like a very light finger on the scale in your favor, but I've forgotten to turn it back to Standard a few times for good reason: it's not that terribly noticeable.
There's at least two mechanics that I'm aware. I have no idea how similar the endgame is for him compared to the other characters, though.
the underground has both the Earth Worm and Phoenix/Bird from other characters' main plots, and two others that correspond to the final boss moves. Then there's the entire choice of which Scarlet Shard to burn for each phase of the boss fight.
Throwing multiple stones is like burning all of your Fate Stones. Throwing just one leads to some variations in the phases. Breaking the underground seals removes boss moves, I'm speculating. I also started getting Quintstones, which by lore seem similar to Scarlet Shards? Maybe those also play into it?
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I have dialogue drop the framerate down to single digits for some reason. The game comes back to being responsive the moment they're over. It's really weird. I didn't have that on Switch.
And I finished Leonard's campaign. I have no idea whether the things I did actually made the final boss easier, or if I just got lucky with RNG in phase two.
This game is a lot of fun, can't believe how much I'm enjoying myself just figuring random stuff out as I go along. Very satisfying to have things start to click, all of the choices and branching paths are really cool, seems like it will be a fun game to replay often. After reading this thread I didnt expect any way to heal in battles but it turns out one of the characters I recruited came with a single Target and party wide heal that does 50-60 hp.
Still have a lot to figure out but it's slowly coming together.
Still have a lot to figure out but it's slowly coming together.
How did you get the honey from the bees? I did the battles in the two jungles but I didn't get any reward...
I think you can examine the left jungle and get it, but a battle or two might be needed to pass the time.
This is really weird, but in order to trigger the honey I went BACK to Misery and talked to the NPC there. This triggered the southwestern forest to become an interact point again (without any visual indication, mind you!), at which point I was able to gather the honey and give it to the bartender.
So what are "Infamous Monsters" and what carries over into NG+? I only kept it because it was one of the things strongly recommended (other than Formations, which I did not carry). Also, carrying over Product Development probably makes the game slightly harder, because you don't have the great source of mid-tier crafting that is the initial development of any good.
Anyhow, I feel like I'm crushing Balmaint's story so far. I managed to beat several plot-related, limited-time Hard encounters. I'm also already encountering a bunch of sidequests I didn't see with Leonard, and a sudden Hard sidequest encounter with an NPC that was purely friendly in Leonard's quest.
The battle system just has so much depth.
The ONE thing that I feel isn't sufficiently explained and is buried in tutorials is what it means to Quell a Conditional with a Bow attack. Unless the conditional/counter is explicitly tagged to Ranged/Piercing/%Target, a bow hit will deactivate their ready stance. That's the main value of the Quick Bow skill or whatever it is called.
Anyhow, I feel like I'm crushing Balmaint's story so far. I managed to beat several plot-related, limited-time Hard encounters. I'm also already encountering a bunch of sidequests I didn't see with Leonard, and a sudden Hard sidequest encounter with an NPC that was purely friendly in Leonard's quest.
The battle system just has so much depth.
The ONE thing that I feel isn't sufficiently explained and is buried in tutorials is what it means to Quell a Conditional with a Bow attack. Unless the conditional/counter is explicitly tagged to Ranged/Piercing/%Target, a bow hit will deactivate their ready stance. That's the main value of the Quick Bow skill or whatever it is called.
What is this excess flux doing for me when I absorb it into spells? Should I be paying attention to the elements?
Flux ranks your spells up and can sometimes cause you to spark new ones.
"Infamous Monsters" you mean the Scarlet Fiends? They spawn after you do a TON of quest in a specific region. They have a huge fireball symbol. There is one for each region and when one of the symbol appear for the first time there is a tutorial prompt.
New game plus stuff
I did some Scarlet Fiends before beating the game, but the NG+ interface explicitly uses the term "Infamous" something or other, and something about "progress" along those lines. They could be the same, i.e. quest progress is advanced so they appear earlier in NG+.
I didn't grind much in my Ulpina playthrough back then.
There's so much happening I got strong naturally and honestly you need to be strong only for the last boss (or some specific side content).
Your main characters should use 2 or 3 weapons for roles and having 2 or 3 choices should make you at least have 1 out of 3 weapons upgradable in any region.
I understand the crystal problem but at the same time, you're supposed to mostly follow story with Ulpina and her story is not really hard overall.
But I agree that it's nice to have freedom which you get later.
So now imagine if you're stuck with only one region, and boss place for level up and forge (which is almost impossible), after going through the game a bit too fast.
I saw you won but just to add, because you don't always need to just grind (only if you're really low "level" and don't have good gear)
The last boss battle usually triggers a lot more Benison so having roles to raise the rate of healing one for example is nice.
Your high HP characters shield the multi hit attacks users (bow, lightning, twin sword) or biggest possible attacks with high rank for reduced BP cost.
Depending on what you have that's how it gets more or less achievable.
The other way (or both together if you can) is to have one or 2 very fast characters try to stun the boss. Needless to say if you can stun at least 1 turn, it's really helpful especially if you can get another good attack or magic beside.
I remember stunning the boss 2 or 3 times once which made it so much easier.
For the phase after, once you know which types are disrupted you can act accordingly.
A good mage is really important as most spells don't trigger the interrupts.
You play safe basically. But yeah, need prudence that's for sure.
Your high HP characters shield the multi hit attacks users (bow, lightning, twin sword) or biggest possible attacks with high rank for reduced BP cost.
Depending on what you have that's how it gets more or less achievable.
The other way (or both together if you can) is to have one or 2 very fast characters try to stun the boss. Needless to say if you can stun at least 1 turn, it's really helpful especially if you can get another good attack or magic beside.
I remember stunning the boss 2 or 3 times once which made it so much easier.
For the phase after, once you know which types are disrupted you can act accordingly.
A good mage is really important as most spells don't trigger the interrupts.
You play safe basically. But yeah, need prudence that's for sure.
For the "quell"condition for rewards, it's really weird localisation. Despite having played the game to death already I also had to think a bit to guess what it was.
It was much clearer in japanese.
There have been some details removed/altered here and there that I can't explain...
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Okay so I'm doing Urpina's route, and just entered the 4th area. The only person I have rn that can heal is the mage you start off with. I've had him use it twice so far, the second time after I ranked it up, and it only heals my party like 6hp.
Considering that even the weakest enemy attacks do 30hp, I'm surely doing something wrong because it can't be that useless.
Edit: It also heals status effects so its possible it's main use is that, and the healing part is just a (useless) bonus. If that's the case, should I have a character by now that heals? I accidentally left the second area early and probably only completed 50% of it.
Considering that even the weakest enemy attacks do 30hp, I'm surely doing something wrong because it can't be that useless.
Edit: It also heals status effects so its possible it's main use is that, and the healing part is just a (useless) bonus. If that's the case, should I have a character by now that heals? I accidentally left the second area early and probably only completed 50% of it.
I've seen someone mention the water healing spell is good. Your experience is the same as mine. Combat in this game is much more about mitigation, interrupting and countering. As you learn more techs it becomes easier to influence the combat to increase your survivability.
But yeah, healing does not appear to be the desired strategy.
You're not doing anything wrong. Healing is not really a strategy you can rely on in this game. There is an AoE heal that will do an okay amount called Rain of Life, it's a tier 3 water spell. But generally your strategies should be to mitigate and prevent damage entirely.
How's the Android version? Is it the same game? That's the only version I have access to currently : (
edit: Actually I don't see it in the Google Play Store.
edit edit: Oh ffs it isn't playable on the Pixelbook? That sucks.
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Where I'm at now I don't really NEED healing, my strategy has been working out so far (hardest part was the first map but haven't had TOO much trouble since). I just thought that if healing was viable I'd be able to lighten up a little, then again the difficulty is what makes the combat system fun to use.
You'll be able to come back later. The whole game is never 100% linear for every character. There are some open moments.
It's actually better to do so in some cases.