Acrobat or bard dilemma

[darkange]

So I just bought the game(a little late I know :P) and I have a question :
I want to choose Bard because I am thinking I will get level up faster and I will have a lot of spells by the end of the game with multiple characters but at the same time by choosing Acrobat I get access to those cliff chests ... I am wondering if you get other characters later in game who can jump on cliffs or if all those chests contain only items ... do you getarmor/weapons later on in the game from those chests or all of them contain just items (healing/magic/revive etc) ?

[Indinera]

I would need to summon Kes as your questions are very specific.
From what I can remember:
a) the items weren't that good or important IMO
b) however no-one else can do it (jump on high cliffs)
c) I liked playing the bard, personally

[darkange]

oh well ... since I am a hardcore guy I chose the acrobat eventually and also chose warrior on Eva - I have no healing guy in my party at all - this would be fun ... plus the fact that I play directly on legendary as I always do ... so far its ok with no healing member in my party.

By the way : best part of the game so far is the remarks we get when Dathan interacts with a mirror ... I am laughing so hard lol

[Kes]

a) the items weren't that good or important IMO

I don't agree with that - though naturally I'm a bit biased here. Without the healing skills of the Bard, those items are very helpful. Especially if you have Eva as Warrior instead of Guardian.

b) however no-one else can do it (jump on high cliffs)

True

c) I liked playing the bard, personally

I have a soft spot for Bard, but I do like being able to use items without having to use up my turn.

@darkage
I'm really interested in how Acrobat and Warrior turn out for you in Legendary mode. Keep me posted!

[darkange]

@Kes so far it's great .... I am in Eastern Hills and just killed some wolves in a cave ... I do indeed use some healing potions and healing items with Dathan before his turn sometimes but most of the time I got enough disabling spells : Dathan can blind the enemies and make them miss and Eva can stun them ... not to mention the crowd control spells from Kris ... the funniest part is that I invested almost all the spending points in agility on every character - I always attack first with all my characters and that gives me a big advantage in controlling the enemies or killing them fast.

I am usually frustrated in turn based rpgs when the enemy attacks before me so this time I thought fuck this - I would put 90 % of my spending points in agility and see what happens. - except for my acrobat ... spent all my points in agility and when I saw I even have a skill that is using agility I was so happy :P . What I don't understand is how can he still miss sometimes(even with skills) when he is waaay more faster than the enemies . I am assuming the Hit rate stat has nothing to do with your agility but yet I don't see any stat influencing it either.

[Kes]

Using your points on agility at this stage makes a lot of sense, but just a heads up - if you neglect your MDF completely you may regret it later.

About your Miss query - if you look on the stats page of the Status menu, you can see all the individual stats, including HIT, for each character. Unless it's been modified by gear, Dathan has 99% HIT rate. So there is a very slight chance of a miss.

While it is true that the AGI is taken into account when determining a hit/miss,what is also taken into account is the evasion (EVA) rate that an enemy has. As I didn't set any enemy with 0% EVA, there is always a chance that they will successfully evade.

[darkange]

Using your points on agility at this stage makes a lot of sense, but just a heads up - if you neglect your MDF completely you may regret it later.

About your Miss query - if you look on the stats page of the Status menu, you can see all the individual stats, including HIT, for each character. Unless it's been modified by gear, Dathan has 99% HIT rate. So there is a very slight chance of a miss.

While it is true that the AGI is taken into account when determining a hit/miss,what is also taken into account is the evasion (EVA) rate that an enemy has. As I didn't set any enemy with 0% EVA, there is always a chance that they will successfully evade.

I see ... now it makes sense ... cause I remember from other games of yours like Tale of a common man when I had characters with 199 % hit rate (after I equip them with an item) and they would still miss ... I was like WTF - how can you miss when you are beyond 100 % ?

[darkange]

by the way ... when Kris reflects spells does it mean he wont learn that spell if he was supposed to learn it ? I have an upgrade for him where he is supposed to reflect 30 % of Magic but I don't think I want it if that means it's difficult to learn spells with him ...

[Kes]

You should be okay. If a skill misses then he doesn't learn it. But he has to be hit with it in order for him to reflect it - it's only the damage which is reflected, not the spell itself.

In playtesting I chose that option for the upgrade and he always learnt everything that he could.

[darkange]

Got it Kes ....
I got to ask this cause it is killing me : wha's with the monk going into the gardens after you leave the shrine ? I go back and it says the door its locked .. he locked it behind him ? That's wierd ...

[Kes]

This becomes clearer once you've spoken to the monks in the shrine in Dorgate.

What he's doing is sending a message by pigeon post - in the same way as the Zerlander sent a crow with a message. (How else can you get message around quickly before the days of the phone?) When you speak to the Abbot in Dorgate he tells you that they have received a message from the Shrine in Clifton.

And as for the door being locked - it was locked before he went there, cuz it's a private garden, and at the end of the little scene you see him leaving the garden and, of course, he will have re-locked it.

[darkange]

This becomes clearer once you've spoken to the monks in the shrine in Dorgate.

What he's doing is sending a message by pigeon post - in the same way as the Zerlander sent a crow with a message. (How else can you get message around quickly before the days of the phone?) When you speak to the Abbot in Dorgate he tells you that they have received a message from the Shrine in Clifton.

And as for the door being locked - it was locked before he went there, cuz it's a private garden, and at the end of the little scene you see him leaving the garden and, of course, he will have re-locked it.

I wouldn't have guessed that in a million years lol ...
Progressed further and was wondering if the second door in the basement of the mansion can be opened later on or it stays locked forever ? The characters say " the big key does not work here "

[Kes]

You will get to know the purpose of that door much later on, but you won't be able to open it. In the meantime, you could be speculating to yourself about why that second, very similar, door might be there.

[darkange]

all right... I finished the game and found the purpose of the second door indeed ...
Before I fill in the memories I want to know if there are 12 secondary quests or 12 quests in total because I only found Q1 - Q10 - finished them all ... one quest was find all the secret rooms but it is not marked by a number - finished that one too ... and the main quest that you keep all game is not marked either ... together they make for 12 quests but not 12 secondary quests ... so which one is it ?
Also - are there any new skills on characters beyond level 27/28 ? That's the maximum level I got to without optional grinding - only bumping and clicking into every wall for secret rooms and killing enemies along the way. By the way : I finished it in 22 hours - more than you advirtised - that was cool :P

In the end I can say that for a guy like me who is expert in turn based rpgs ... legendary difficulty is not that hard and it is definitely doable with acrobat and warrior ... I used indeed Dathan healing ability at T0 (turn zero) quite often but after Lyndia gets upgraded - she is too OP when you transform her - no need for potions anymore - free revive all the way for allies and enemies couldn't kill her .
Also I still spent most points in agility for all the characters - even the last one who joins you and he is slow as fuck.... he gains only 1 agility point per 1 point spent .
One of the most interesting things was how Eva had low self confidence considering she did the most dmg by far in the team .... I liked to use her ability "Blast" a lot and in order to do that I kept her under 10 % hp most of the time and equiped her with a lot of Evasion and Magic evasion and criticals - she was rarely killed and she was doing insane dmg all the time and critical hits a lo - to me that ability is the best if you know how to keep Eva alive.

I am only disappointed and frustrated by Kris ability to steal the spells from enemies - first of all it is a pain in the ass to always wait for enemies to hit him - even if you use his ability to make all your allies but him less targetable - enemies still ignore him sometimes and it still takes a lot of times to get hit with all the spells - it was much easier and convenient in A timely intervention where you could just steal enemies ability with a skill - efficient and fast.
Second of all - most of the spells I stole from enemies were really not that good - I know littlebro for example said Wicked is briliant - in other modes maybe but in legendary mode it was almost useless for me - poor dmg/heal and rarely inflicts sleep.
Other than that all was good.

[Kes]

It looks like you missed a quest, because there are 12 (ncluding the secret rooms) plus the main quest. If you had 1 - 10 then

Spoiler: show

you missed the one in Withyside.

By missing that one, you also reduced the bonus you get for prayers said for you and you don't get all the bonuses in the reward chest given to you at the end.

There are no skills after level 27, and only one at that level.

I used Eva in much the same way you did when I had her as warrior. I wrote the characters so that the one person people might dismiss as just a bit boring in fact was almost the most valuable to the team, and the one with the highest opinion of himself was a lot less so. I'm sure you've met people like that in real life!

I wonder if you got all the skills from the enemies - a couple of them are really quite strong. I'll have to look into that.

I saw your appreciative comment in 'Memories' about the NPC dialogues changing - thank you, it's a lot of work but worth it, imo. Even though I'm fairly sure that only a handful of players would go back to Clifton after arriving in Dorgate, those that do will find out who won the boat race, and what people thought of it.

I'm glad that overall you enjoyed it. Thank you for playing.