Bravely Default: Come for the dumb name, stay for the FFV job system

[triangles]

I guess it depends on what sort of RPGs you are into (we talking JRPGs or like Mass Effect or ??)

FF3 on the DS was pretty lousy in that it remakes a NES game but just shifted one set of annoyances and questionable game design choices for another.  Don't use that as a litmus test for this.  Bravely Default, on the other hand, feels like an old school RPG (aka the stuff I've been playing since I was 12) but has all sorts of modern conveniences that really add a lot of polish - save points are far more logical, and so far in every dungeon I've done there's been one right before the boss/plot.  Also I am such a huge sucker for job class dress up games so I'm slightly biased

Spoiler:

and in a day or so I should be able to squirrel up more proof how double biased I am

Chapter 3, ahoy!  Red Mage asterisk was a pain but once I get Performer I will be one step closer to having ~TEAM FABULOUS~

[Third Eye Lem]

Stuck on the Wind Temple boss.

Spoiler:

Whomever thought it was a fair idea for the boss to be allowed to double-cast highly damaging AOE elemental attacks with little to no protection to counter it should be fired and sent to Atlus instead.

[triangles]

Do you have a thief?  The fruits of your thievery + black magic should make short work of the sucker, provided you aren't underleveled.

[Third Eye Lem]

Do you have a thief?  The fruits of your thievery + black magic should make short work of the sucker, provided you aren't underleveled.

...Wow I never even considered that, lawl. My party's level 19-20, Thief/Monk/WM/BM, though I may make my Thief into another Monk.

EDIT: Strategy worked like a charm, thanks!

UPDATE: Now the dungeon after that is kicking my butt...Time to grind. =P

[Garlyle]

:fail: Looks like I'm gonna switch Edea out of Thief very soon...It's not that strong of a job, damage wise. Abate Wind is nice at least, and I assume you'll know Mug Stab and Grab at some point, but that might be a while still.

Time to stick Twohanded on Edea with the Thief's Knife, then! Wait no she can't do that. Bluh. :V

Thief's actually pretty fantastic for damage because its high speed gets it plenty of attacks in a turn - you just need to equip them with something other than daggers.  There's some stupidly powerful bows early in the game (especially the Angel Bow from Nordende's Weapon Shop at level 3/4 which can carry you through the first two chapters easy), and later you can just give them a weapon lore from another class (fistfighter thief hell yeah)

Anyway, Bravely Default I can pretty highly recommend.  Unless you absolutely hate the JRPG formula, it seems more or less to be the old school, classic kind of JRPG but done in a way that does its best not to adhere to many of the old traps and weaknesses the genre had in the past.

[Third Eye Lem]

Thief's actually pretty fantastic for damage because its high speed gets it plenty of attacks in a turn - you just need to equip them with something other than daggers.  There's some stupidly powerful bows early in the game (especially the Angel Bow from Nordende's Weapon Shop at level 3/4 which can carry you through the first two chapters easy), and later you can just give them a weapon lore from another class (fistfighter thief hell yeah)

Sword thief for me, though I like bows too.

On that note...I just got Mystic Knight! Spell Fencer! Edea's rockin' the harem girl look, it is awesome...And yet she can still wear heavy armor. :V Oh FF, you and your lack of visibly equipped armor~

[triangles]

HEY GUYS
So when you all get to the salve-maker fight (chapter 3, in the dungeon to the north) make sure you don't have damage dispersion equipped on anyone.
Just trust me.

Also this chapter's fetch-questyness is mrgrgr  They have airships but why no phones?

[Bio]

Because phones don't run on ~*magic*~

[Third Eye Lem]

HEY GUYS
So when you all get to the salve-maker fight (chapter 3, in the dungeon to the north) make sure you don't have damage dispersion equipped on anyone.
Just trust me.

I never use DD so I think I'll be fine. Heh.

The Abate skills are super-useful though. Still working my way through Ch2.

[triangles]

If you're in Chapter 2 still, there is one asterisk where damage dispersion is super useful though :V

[yuyukos]

Finished upgrading town, not even Chapter 2 yet.

[Third Eye Lem]

If you're in Chapter 2 still, there is one asterisk where damage dispersion is super useful though :V

If it's who I think it is, I'll consider it. I may just do a bit of level-grinding anyways, the Red Mage asterisk gave me a bit of trouble and enemies are hitting harder than they should be. :< I miss having a nigh-invincible party sometimes...

[triangles]

SO HOW ABOUT THAT CHAPTER 4 SUBQUEST
I was trying to not completely break the game open, but then after waltzing to the first dude unprepared and trying my General Boss Idea I saw that

Spoiler:

Utsusemi worked on those stupid breathe attacks?  Well I'll be.  brb getting 4x !Ninja + Turn Tables + Transience.  I've got one more stupiddragon to kill and then I go back to Dracula's castle or whatever

Swordmaster is stupid fun.  I can't decide if I like or hate the female Arcanist outfits.  Spiritmaster is so amazing on everyone the costumes in this game are just so precious ahhhh.  Except Ranger just looks dumb, but on the other hand it made Ringabel being skeevy double hilarious, so congratulations you got to learn the target weakness skills  :V

Although now that I'm on the heels of the earth crystal I'm really starting to think at least one of my crazy theories is right, or at least right-ish.  Evidence including

Spoiler:

running out of land to explore, games with blue magic usually give it far earlier than I'd be getting it if this was being run straight = good chance to loop back around and get all the stuff I "missed" already, and oh yeah everyone being UH YOU SURE YOU WANNA DO THAT PROBABLY GONNA BREAK EVERYTHING FINE BE THAT WAY as per my theory before.  I still don't know how Alternis fits into this mumbo jumbo, but at least I did get confirmation the sage does have some shenanigans about him.  Maybe it is closer to FF5 than I originally thought after all!

[Third Eye Lem]

Slogging my way through Ch.3 now...Jegus, the bosses sure get durable pretty fast.

Spoiler:

Barbarossa wasn't too bad because Thunder weakness but Praline...A word advice, bring at least two characters with Dispel, equip everyone with Peace Rings, and go physical on her--but do NOT kill both her troops. You will sorely regret it.

And no sign of the

Spoiler:

Ninja class yet... ;___; I just wanna fight Komoe and listen to her awesome Blurr-style speech, and get her Asterisk so I can teach everyone Dual Wield...IS THAT SO MUCH TO ASK FOR :fail:

[The Greatest Dog]

Fun fact: the troops summoned from the Performer and Summoner job fights

Spoiler:

are definitely vulnerable to sleep

.

[triangles]

Yeah that's pretty much how I beat those two.  You'll get the job you seek after the fire crystal + some more storyline stuff.

In Chapter 5, what's my timeframe on all the subquests?  Should I blitz through them because uh

Spoiler:

turns out I was sort of right, but I don't know how long Things Will Stay Like This, or if we're going to bungle it up again and it'll be Round X + 3 or and there's A LOT of them

[Bio]

They refresh after each chapter henceforth.

[triangles]

Oh I see how this goes then.  I think I almost wish I wasn't on the right track then in a way  :ohdear:
I'm guessing maybe prioritizing the ones

Spoiler:

that I suspect will change between iterations?  I only did White Mage/Monk and Ranger before going to bed last night, the latter didn't really change but I suspect some of them will, especially if I start ~sequence breaking~ from What It Should Be.  Like I'm thinking of doing the Water Crystal first for the hell of it and seeing if Airy bugs out like Navi does if you do things out of order.  Or if I just waltz up to Victor + Victoria before meeting them in Floremland (thus weakening her) first.

Speaking of I don't think I'm trusting that fairy much anymore and I'm not sure I buy the whole "oh this thing that should have worked didn't or maybe it wasn't really ever going to work idk oh let's just do it again instead of assuming I'm going to get us stuck in Groundhog Day forever" logic.  I'd go look for a Plan B instead but that's just me.

[theshirn]

Finally got my bloody copy, 15 days after I ordered it

Gonna play the hell outta this :V

[triangles]

Yowzers, where did you order from? 
FINALLY YOU JOIN US
HOORAY :toot:

Hahaha turns out in Chapter 5, despite the game's best efforts, I did manage to

Spoiler:

sequence break!  After my update above, I went to Florem to chat with the matriarch and ruh-roh Olivia's already dead :ohdear: guess I gotta go pop open the water crystal myself.  But coming back after I did that, either before or after I did the Red Mage rematch, I trigger a little scene where my crew suggests checking in with the matriarch and seeing how Olivia's doing wherein I just get reintroduced to babby vestal or whatever nonsense that is.

Though they were nice to flag having to visit sage (who confirmed my "x + whatever" iteration theory) after "the second crystal" which was wind in my case.  I still would love for him to be ult evolution Ringabel somehow.  Of course he wouldn't show up at his house before then much to my disappointment, probably to avoid trying to shake down answers before ~the plot~ deemed it ready.

But damn does the game get hard once Chapter 5 kicks in.  Random battles are being total cheeseballs to me first, I'm saving all the time since I can and have gotten one-shotted if they get a freebie turn, so I gotta go and level the playing field with some cheeseball job combos of my own now :colbert:

[Third Eye Lem]

Finally got my bloody copy, 15 days after I ordered it

Gonna play the hell outta this :V

Lemme guess, Amazon?

Either way, would you be willing to share your friend code?

EDIT:

But damn does the game get hard once Chapter 5 kicks in.  Random battles are being total cheeseballs to me first, I'm saving all the time since I can and have gotten one-shotted if they get a freebie turn, so I gotta go and level the playing field with some cheeseball job combos of my own now :colbert:

Sheesh. Have you considered using the

Spoiler:

Pirate class? I heard the Shell Split skill is useful against bosses.

[Bio]

Broken combos are a go.

Spoiler:

Ninja with dual katanas and a pick of Crit Amp, Katana Lore, Precision, Multitask and Frenetic Fighting lets you do over >9999 per BP, Dark Knight with applied Drain Spell Fencing buff lets you Rage for a lot longer and still be on near full HP at the end of it. Spiritmaster being slower than your attackers but faster than enemy lets you abuse Stillness. You can also give all your party elemental absorb and destroy with Dark Nebulae. Free Lunch works well with stuff like Pirate. Mimicing Performer abilities can give your entire party 4 BP every turn. Hasten World with Valkyries using jumps let you never get hit if you're fast than the enemy. You can also run this on a normal team and have a Zero Sum performer remove the enemies' extra BP. Natural Talent + Knuckle Lore and if you want, the thing from Spell Fencer which adds phys. damage to spells lets you have massive physical damage. For healing Holy One + Epic Group Cast are 6000 HP Cures. Group Cast from BM lets you poison everything at once and Exterminate from there on with Arcanist. Can also be used to apply party-wide white buffs. Templar's Rampart also works with Free Lunch for immunity to phys. damage.

[The Greatest Dog]

Belphegor... isn't immune to sleep?
kthx for the -ja tier spells

[Phlegeth]

Just finished the Temple of Fire and I have two words to say: Fuck Chaugmar.  Fuck Chaugmar with a rusty spoon in his big dumb eye.

[Third Eye Lem]

Just finished the Temple of Fire and I have two words to say: Fuck Chaugmar.  Fuck Chaugmar with a rusty spoon in his big dumb eye.

Yeah, that guy is an ass. I had to stick some +HP skills onto everyone just so they could withstand Energy Burst without getting brutally murdered. Having access to Compounding to spam Pantheon's Wraths helped too :V

The

Spoiler:

Swordmaster

boss is much worse IMO.

Spoiler:

He keeps spamming either anti-magic or anti-physical counters, and you have to damage him a bit to get him to actually attack, but when he does, he's vulnerable for a good two turns, so...What I did was attack with one magic user and one heavy hitting weapon user each turn, then revive that person with a Ressurction (Combine a Potion + a Phoenix Down) if anyone gets killed.

Angelic Ward also helped for this boss and the big eyeball bastard.

[The Greatest Dog]

I had a friend with a maxed Merchant so I kinda Low Leveraged through Energy Burst...

[theshirn]

Aight, first party wipe to the summoner.  That 600 damage to everyone move is...an issue.

FC is 5472-6554-9508

[Third Eye Lem]

Aight, first party wipe to the summoner.  That 600 damage to everyone move is...an issue.

FC is 5472-6554-9508

Added you. I hope you like Spell Fencer, because that's p.much the only job I gave my full attention to so far :V (that and Ranger)

Also, I think that attack is

Spoiler:

earth element, so maybe levelling up Time Mage might help??

[theshirn]

Ended up zerg rushing her to death.  Only Agnes and Ringabel survived the massacre. :V

[Third Eye Lem]

Ended up zerg rushing her to death.  Only Agnes and Ringabel survived the massacre. :V

Pffffft. I never ever end a battle with anyone dead if I can help it, the bosses give up so much EXP. I also try not to use uber cheap tactics like spamming damage items

Spoiler:

...Unless it's Chaugmar, that one-eyed ass deserves every Pantheon's Wrath you can throw at it

.