Labyrinth of Touhou 9F

[Ikari]

I think I've been using my Remilia wrong, then. She's practically ALWAYS in my party, especially for randoms. >.<
Speaking of which, what characters are good for randoms? I figure Marisa, Nitori (somewhat), and Ran are, but who else?

I traditionally keep Suwako around, as she's a good mix of all-targetting spells and single target nukes. (For those pesky strong enemies sometime!) I like using Alice too, as she's pretty cost-damage efficient, though she slowly gets less useful as time goes on. Komachi is by far my favorite tank when it comes to random encounters; Not only does her Scythe that Chooses the Dead a great nuke against strong enemies, and her Confines of Avicci can, if you're lucky, cause absolute havoc in a random enemies group. Plus, her row CLD attack has an okay DTH effect too. Basically, 25 % of the time, Komachi may just wipe the entire enemy team, and 50 % of the time, cripple it greatly. Plus, high health means shrugging off those pesky defense-piercing attacks.

Flandre is really good to me too, as I'm terribly impatient. If you're in the mood, you can also use slow, powerful nukers (Patchy, Yuyuko, Kaguya) along with Aya using her speed buff. Usually, unless you stumble on fast enemies, the turns should go Aya -> Nuker. Royal Flare / Saigyouji Flawless Nirvanna / Hourai Jewel should all be renamed "You win", really. This method is better for farming, though, due to the large cost of those spells.

[Nerv-Faktor]

I think I've been using my Remilia wrong, then. She's practically ALWAYS in my party, especially for randoms. >.<
Speaking of which, what characters are good for randoms? I figure Marisa, Nitori (somewhat), and Ran are, but who else?

Remilia has her uses against randoms. She's very fast and will be one of the first characters that outspeed and kill those annoying Strategists on the plusdisk floors.
But generally you want characters with strong multitarget nukes that act before the enemies do. Or a combination of a fast character with a group PAR effect, like Mystia, and a slow nuker who can then follow up, like Yuyuko.

[Parallaxal]

Aside from those mentioned, I've found Orin to be extremely effective at clearing random enemies. Blazing Wheel is second only to Laveatein in terms of damage formula for a composite spell, and fire is fine element to sweep trash mobs with. Former Hell's Needle Hill may not have as high of an ATK multiplier, but its defense piercing properties make it strong enough to take out those high defense enemies that typically have low health anyway (I was using it to one-shot those crabs on 27F while level grinding). And she's one of the fastest characters with a good level up rate to boot. She can probably easily outdamage anyone that's faster than her, against groups of enemies, at any rate. If memory serves, Orin is beaten only by Chen, Aya, Mystia, and possibly Cirno in speed.

Other strong group clearers include Youmu (if you have time to abuse her Focus mechanic against weaker enemies for sustain), Alice (cheap spells, multi-target and non-elemental), and Kaguya (good elemental coverage, ignores defenses entirely).

[Ikari]

Points to Parallaxal, Orin is indeed a great character. I was actually quite surprised; She didn't seem particularly stellar on paper, but in practice, she's actually pretty great. Blazing Wheel is really powerful, and most of her spells have their uses. Plus, Orin's pretty fast, so yeah, she's a very good choice for random encounters.

Youmu is actually rather mediocre, depending on what you encounter. Most multi-target attacks are magic, and thus don't fare too well against magic enemies; That's where Youmu becomes terribly useful... And terribly awful. Her MND is so horrible, she won't be able to get any decent magic assault to the face, so abusing her focus may be much harder on floors with many magic enemies.

[Validon98]

Well, I never really use Youmu. Orin... I've yet to get her, actually. Looks like I have to build up Youmu, Rumia, and Chen's battle points. >.>
I didn't think Komachi was that useful for randoms... well, I guess I AM at that part where everything kills you if you don't kill it faster/neutralize it somehow. Ugh, I've got so much to do before fighting Yukari it's not even funny. But thanks for the advice. That'll hopefully make exploration and grinding a bit easier for now.

[Ikari]

Orin is annoying to get ^^; Her battle is more of a survival match, but here's a tip; She isn't THAT strong by herself, so bringing a few powerful nukers (Patchy, Yuyuko, etc) and spamming their mega nuke to end any of those knights battles in one turn works fine to keep everyone else at top shape.

Speaking of neutralizing, once you get Renko, nothing else will ever matter. If I could marry Galaxy Stop, I would. I would do it several times in a row. Maybe even do a polygamy thing with Debilitate.

[Ghaleon]

Reimu is great for trash too since her par is respectably quick, and lasts rather long for a multitarget.

But mystia is imo one of the best. Very fast, very strong area damage (with a tiny par!), and a weaker, longer par (good spell but not used often cuz her nuke+tiny par is just amazing). Plus her single target nuke is fast and ok for damage so you can often use that first on a tough cookie to soften them before the big aoe nuke.

The rest were mentioned i think.

[Rukoto]

Cirno's Diamond Blizzard is a cheap way to land both multitarget physical CLD damage and a weak party-wide PAR at the same time, which makes her a pretty nice trash cleaner when used in conjunction with characters that love the PAR support. I'm actually a bit surprised at how many enemies in late plus disc have a PAR resist of 0 (granted, there's still a lot of them with double digit PAR resistance). There's also Icicle Fall and Perfect Freeze, which also see use against certain randoms from time to time as well.

Marisa is an interesting trash cleaner because all of her spells are MND influenced and of the MYS element. As one approaches the late game, and well throughout the plus disc, many enemies will be packing high MND, a high MYS affinity, or even both. However, against enemies not packing either of these, Earthlight Ray / Asteroid Belt will rip them a new one pretty fast. Master Spark, at the expense of all her SP, can be used to one-off most randoms. Thankfully, her main trash clearing spells are very low in cost, and she also has pretty decent TP as well. Lastly, she's also pretty fast. She sits at the same SPD growth as Orin, and in exchange for a slightly slower level up speed, Marisa has a slightly cheaper SKP cost for SPD than Orin does.

[Validon98]

I know about Renko, but I'm still pre-Plus Disk. Same for Mystia (I've heard so much about her amazing power that I don't really ever need or want to hear it again). Reimu I know about, but for some reason I completely forget that Evil Sealing Circle=PAR lock on enemies. Marisa I know of course (she's been my random encounter ace since day one, but of course she's starting to show age). Cirno I can't really see myself using much anymore, but oh well. I want to work on getting the characters I've missed. I'll just be clearing trash on floor 1 with Chen's Phoenix Spread Wings with all the other people who are necessary to get the battle points for until I've done 100 battles (1 battle=2 battle points per person). Then I'll get Yuyuko and Orin. ^^;

EDIT: Yuyuko wasn't working out right. I kept failing over and over. So I went to get Mokou instead. Beat her at Chen 67. That wasn't really difficult, although I was a bit worried when she hit her "spam Fujiyama Volcano" phase. Good thing I decided NOT to pull Marisa out until Mokou used Fujiyama Volcano once. Now to grind up the battle points necessary to fight Kaguya's Foe and get Kaguya!

[Ghaleon]

Cirno's Diamond Blizzard is a cheap way to land both multitarget physical CLD damage and a weak party-wide PAR at the same time, which makes her a pretty nice trash cleaner when used in conjunction with characters that love the PAR support. I'm actually a bit surprised at how many enemies in late plus disc have a PAR resist of 0 (granted, there's still a lot of them with double digit PAR resistance). There's also Icicle Fall and Perfect Freeze, which also see use against certain randoms from time to time as well.

Marisa is an interesting trash cleaner because all of her spells are MND influenced and of the MYS element. As one approaches the late game, and well throughout the plus disc, many enemies will be packing high MND, a high MYS affinity, or even both. However, against enemies not packing either of these, Earthlight Ray / Asteroid Belt will rip them a new one pretty fast. Master Spark, at the expense of all her SP, can be used to one-off most randoms. Thankfully, her main trash clearing spells are very low in cost, and she also has pretty decent TP as well. Lastly, she's also pretty fast. She sits at the same SPD growth as Orin, and in exchange for a slightly slower level up speed, Marisa has a slightly cheaper SKP cost for SPD than Orin does.

Actually marisa is relatively good against high mnd trash (I mean, compared to other mag nukers. obviously a aoe physical is more ideal but those are less common, if you don't really have any...) because asteroid belt is actually pretty proficient at piercing mnd compared to other solid spammy aoe magic nukes.

[Validon98]

That's why I've always liked using Marisa. Although, for F16 a party of Komachi (as my "tank"), Remilia (to soften up tougher enemies, although she's mostly useless), Nitori (Physical AoE) and Patchouli (Magical AoE) is actually working for most encounters.
Also, finally beat Yuyuko at Chen 68 (I only use Chen as a placemarker for levels. I don't really use her in battle)! In the end, only Iku, Tenshi, and Nitori remained. If Nitori's last attack didn't kill Yuyuko, I would've probably lost right then and there. These close battles scare me sometimes.

[Ikari]

From Mokou and beyond, I never ever won a battle in a different way than this;

Only Tenshi left, with little life, not enough to use her buff.

Me: Meh, screw it. *Uses her single target attack*
*Kills the boss*
Me: Holy fuck.

You'd think I'd get used to it after all the victories that ended that way. Still makes me squeal.

[Ghaleon]

From Mokou and beyond, I never ever won a battle in a different way than this;

Only Tenshi left, with little life, not enough to use her buff.

Me: Meh, screw it. *Uses her single target attack*
*Kills the boss*
Me: Holy fuck.

You'd think I'd get used to it after all the victories that ended that way. Still makes me squeal.

I get that alot on my first times playing various rpgs. Whats funny is nothing like that EVER happens in rpgs where bosses have isible healthbars =p. not just the lack of surprise, but the whole opportunity never happens at all.

[Zil]

I got that with Meiling a few times. (Never used Tenshi.)

My personal favorite instance of this, however, was against the Starman Deluxe in Earthbound. I wasn't expecting it to know PSI Starstorm, and so everyone but Jeff was killed almost immediately. Then Jeff just soloed the whole fight using basically nothing but the hungry hp sucker. The lesser enemies that the boss called in actually kept me alive. T'was pretty hilarious.

[Gesh86]

For anyone who is interested in the LoT2-trial, but is bothered by it's unfinished-ness, I have made a little video-thingy: http://youtu.be/1k2vEKSPAxw

It's the Youmu battle with music and sounds mostly taken from Labyrinth 1, including some annotated commentary giving my thoughts and strategies for that encounter and the game.

[DarkAtma]

Currently at 25F with chen lv193, Defeated hibachi twins V1 and all bosses V2 except maribel, I tried celestial demon and got wiped, decided to try flame tyrant to see how badly i would do and i won in the most stupid possible way  :V, started battle with my bossing team Meiling,remilia,Reimu,kaguya, All of them except meiling got wiped by the first hellfire, switched renko in and spamed galaxy stop, kept the tyrant par locked the whole battle while flandre,chen,aya,orin,komachi,marisa,utsuho chipped all its Hp slowly, and i got its drop to boot :3, Also should i keep grinding at 20F or i should move somewhere else?

EDIT

I tried to equip the black ocarina to meiling and she would have 557 Fire resist, wasnt the cap 500?

[qazmlpok]

Currently at 25F with chen lv193, Defeated hibachi twins V1 and all bosses V2 except maribel, I tried celestial demon and got wiped, decided to try flame tyrant to see how badly i would do and i won in the most stupid possible way  :V, started battle with my bossing team Meiling,remilia,Reimu,kaguya, All of them except meiling got wiped by the first hellfire, switched renko in and spamed galaxy stop, kept the tyrant par locked the whole battle while flandre,chen,aya,orin,komachi,marisa,utsuho chipped all its Hp slowly, and i got its drop to boot :3, Also should i keep grinding at 20F or i should move somewhere else?

EDIT

I tried to equip the black ocarina to meiling and she would have 557 Fire resist, wasnt the cap 500?

I believe the resistance cap is just 65535. It is definitely not 500, as most of my characters have more than that from having 3 machine god lucifers equipped. Increasing resistance past 500 isn't very practical due to diminishing returns, but it is certainly possible.

[Ghaleon]

Increasing resist from 200 to 400 is just as significant as 100 to 200, then 400 to 800, etc...
And most people intentionally par lock foame tyrant, dont expect that to work on any other boss though except that 2 phase robot bloody seal v2 boss... Its immune to par in phase 2 but phase 1 isnt (you have to damage like 50x more hp though that way). Don do it though, flame tyrant is mostly design, the other one is kinda exploitish and its be a damn shame to miss how rapetastic that boss is for your first time.

[DarkAtma]

Where i am supposed to grind? Every boss i face is nuking me: Baal avatar,celestial demon,utsuho, bloody papa V2, Wich one i need to beat to progress to the 26F?

EDIT

 Finally defeated baal avatar, landed two lucky par with galaxy stop, now to what level i should grind for the celestial demon & agastrobrauma?

[Parallaxal]

I personally think Celestial Bright Demon is a little easier than Baal Avatar, actually. He's more annoying than truly dangerous, what with his frustrating multi-target SP drain spell that he likes to cast. He does have a lot of HP, though. Either way, I think you should go for him next.

Honestly now, grinding on the 20th floor is still fine even that far into the Plus Disk. The real treasure trove of grinding is 27F (for the Lilliths), but until then 20F is decent for the ease of the battles and the nice rare drops.

[Serela]

Celestial Bright Demon is annoying with his status effects and draining. But his attacks aren't terribly powerful themselves, from what I remember. (At a proper level, of course. If you could beat Baal, though...) Like, Meiling can literally just solo him focus/heal/mountainbreaker spamming, at a reliable amount. So, just make sure to bunker down. Perhaps prepare for your front line to be regularly SP drained >_> SP recovery gear isn't -completely- useless...

[I have no name]

SP recovery gear is good, especially on Marisa. My WINNER equips on her could use Master Spark then focus, and immediately fire off another Spark.  Not that that's ever useful because of its formula.

Also, I corrupted part of the game's temporary memory space by going OOB on 11F and stepping above the 0 coordinate.  This had the effect of overwriting the entire bottom row of the map with one way left tiles.  I couldn't step back into the map, but I could see it from the map screen.

[DarkAtma]

Celestial demon defeated, Only agastrobruma remains, However by looking at its script in the database he is supposed to use djinn storm first turn, but he just doesnt do it, its my game bugged or something?  :V

[Serela]

Yeah he doesn't actually have it for whatever reason.

[DarkAtma]

Defeating agastrobruma with a final lucky starbow break, after picking all the loot i am off to 26F, them i noticed i must beat eiki to get to 27F to farm liliths  :colonveeplusalpha:  Highest hp char is meiling with 55k and komachi with 56k, i guess its grind time!

[Ghaleon]

How does your komachi have barely more than china?

Anyway, you dont really need to. I just get 1shot by her thing like a baws and try to kill her before i lose too many peeps to it.

[DarkAtma]

Because i have pumped pure HP into meiling and Pure atk into komachi in levelups

Meiling

Decided to swap komachi atk gear for Hp gear to see the result wich choice its better?

[SuccinctAndPunchy]

For anyone who is interested in the LoT2-trial, but is bothered by it's unfinished-ness, I have made a little video-thingy: http://youtu.be/1k2vEKSPAxw

Posting to let you know I appreciate the effort put into making this watchable.

Wanted to take a punt at the demo but I can't read Japanese, so thanks man.

[DarkAtma]

kills reimu with judgement, next turn focuses, the characters in the picture are the only survivors after the battle

[Parallaxal]

Nice work. Getting the drop after a close battle is such a sweet feeling.