Vagrant Story Perfecting Guide & Questions

[Omega]

Has anyone ever played it?

Did you like it/not like it, didn't like the reviews simply and never gave it a try?

If you did play it, what did you think were the games greatest pro's and is there any cons or things that you would have rather changed?

This game did receive a perfect 40/40 from the Famitsu scale, which only 6 games all time have achieved that, just so you know.

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Aside from those questions this is going to be the start of a long post, that since this game is rare, many of you won't care, don't know, or won't read, and that's cool. Gotta post this at another forum when I'm done anyway.

Well 6 years ago a friend of mine and I went to someone's house and they told us of this game, and they put it in and played it for us. We both fell in love with and nicknamed it "the movie". The game doesn't even have a ton of FMV's but more Cinematic scenes than anything. Nonetheless the storyline was incredible and the game in itself just draws you in and is so interesting and challenging that you want to get through it to see what happens next. The story itself could be compared to the complexity of Final Fantasy Tactics and it's no surprise that they were made by the same head designer and team. So if you liked that game for the story, you'll love this one, while admittedly a completely different style of play.

In this thread I thought I'd give as much information I can to those who may have the game and never have perfected it, or those who may want to go give it a test regardless of how much of a completion percentage you want to get out of it.

Since that night I bought the game and so did everyone else that heard of it in the town I lived in back then, and I beat the game before anyone, including the person who originally showed us the game. The game itself is very challenging and I've seen many people that borrowed it, that return it 2 days later, and then another 2 days later...they're like...lemme borrow it again, I think I can go on. Then after they play it they call it the best game they've ever played. I won't go that far with it, but it's certainly one of the most incredible titles I've ever played.

I lost twice to the end boss before finally beating him. Then I basically put the game away for a few years. Recently just this year I had the notion that I really wanted to perfect this title, since it's so hard to do and kind of...get the monkey off my back if you will. So I took up the challenge and just completed it about a week ago. So without further ado, I'm going to explain as much as I can that I think is beneficial, without showing lists of madness that is, as there really is no point to that, since you can find that stuff on gamefaqs.com of course.

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Character: Ashley Riot

Level: 16 Grand Master Breaker

Experience: 130,697,340

HP: 999

MP: 412

Strength: 486

Intelligence: 460

Agility: 470

Titles: 32/32

Encyclopaedia: Full

Cleared: 17 Times

Record Completion Time: 5:33

Saved: 323 Times

Chain Ability High Score: 31

Kill List: All Creature Types Killed Exactly 5,000 Times

Attack List: All Weapon Types Attacked With Exactly 5,000 Times

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Basic Information

That's my character basically or the things that I could list that you wouldn't know if you played the game as well. I easily can tell you whether you have or not that I have every spell in the game, and if it is a spell with multiple levels I have them all up to there max levels. Of course if I have all the Titles, that means I have all the Break Arts and Chain/Defense or Battle Abilities. I also have all the rare items in the game, including all the rare accessories, all the rare weapons, and all the rare gems which are mostly found on those rare weapons. Which of course by having all spells, I have all the rare grimoires to.

So to start this off with advice, the first thing I could say to the starting player is that you'll love the intro's, watch them before even starting the game or pressing anything, then hit start and watch that intro as well, as that is the best one they have, then finally after a good 15 minutes of storyline and a few action scenes you literally are into the game and are off on your way.

Don't get frustrated, in the beginning things are going to seem easy, but soon enough you'll find that things are getting harder, even in the 2nd map area you go to which is the Catacombs or in fact the final boss before leaving the Wine Cellar. You got to get used to keeping your health up, and you have to start learning how to use your Chain and Defense Abilities that you should have learned after fighting the first boss in "The Gallows" room of the Wine Cellar.

Do some experimenting, see what Chain/Defense abilities you like and would like to employ. The more you use them, the faster you'll gain more, which is really good. The Strat Guide for the game suggests only one thing, get DEMONSCALE Defense Ability before the end of the game. I needed it the first time I ever beat the game, but after coming back this year, I rolled randomly and that was the only Battle Ability whatsoever I didn't have when I fought the final boss, and I still won. But that was experience on my side, not luck, don't push it, and just get Demonscale whenever the chance arises.

I prefer Crimson Pain, Heavy Shot, and Raging Ache for Chain Abilities, and for Defense I use Reverse Damage, Reverse Magic, and Impact Guard. Later after I hit basically a point where I couldn't die anymore, I used Ward instead of Impact Guard as I hated being paralyzed or numbed. Regardless of what I like, find out what works best for you.

The only real notable thing on Chain/Defense abilities is that the Strat Guide and Game Manual don't list all of them, and the one's they dont' list are Phantom Pain for Chain and Phantom Shield for Defense. Both are overrated IMO, and are usually the last one's you get for Chain and Defense before you master them all.

As far as weapons when I playthrough my first time, I chose 6 different weapons to gain affinities for each specific type of enemy. Dragon, Evil, Human, Beast, Phantom, and Undead. A few strategists say that it's best to find weapons of material and the right type of attack such as edged, piercing, or blunt to make you the most effective as possible for fighting certain types of monsters. Such as piercing against Dragon types or blunt against Undead types. I personally don't think it matters that much, but I'm sure it does have some effect. I just found it easier I guess to switch through weapons, therefore ensuring me one powerful weapon against each type of monster. Other people have went through the game with one weapon solely and never changed it though, and this is your option as well.

The thing many of you that liked FF IX perhaps that will like about this game, is simply the customization properties. You can combine so many different types of weapons and armor to make different things that it's incredible. Granted there is always an end point to this, as you can't keep combining and making the game come up with new weapons, there are max points. But there are also methods to make weapons/armor become "ultimate" so to say. I'm not even going to go into that though. The time required to do such a thing is ridiculous and I didn't do it myself, as after my 7th playthrough I wasn't even being hit anyway it felt like, and with that said, I could be beating these people with a blade of grass forever and I'd still kill them with it before they kill me.

In short Ultimate Weapons and Armor means that the statistics of the piece of equipment are unchanging and are at max value. The problem with trying to create that defensively or offensively is that the affinities of each weapon type adjust as you hit something. Like if I hit a Human my weapon might raise an affinity point towards humans, but it also might lower Beast. It's whatever is below the type of creature on the sub menu that might get lowered, and Evil which is on the bottom, reduces Human points which is on the top. So think of it as a circle. That really is how you gain higher attack power to. Affinities. Which is what I was trying to explain in the previous paragraph. The more you attack a creature type, the more effective you'd be theoretically attacking creatures of that same type, with that same weapon. So there fore the weapon doesn't get any stronger or powerful, your just getting better at using it against them.

Customization in this is very deep, and not only can you combine off pieces of Weapons like an Axe and a Sword, but the same with Armor, and basically the game knows what piece of armor/weapon to make it, whether it be something totally odd, or something stronger or weaker. There is an excellent guide on gamefaqs.com, which I believe it's called the Combining Guide, that tells you every combination there is. Armor and Weapons all come in several different types of material which are Leather, Bronze, Iron, Silver, Hagane, and Damascus. Wood might be an option as well, but is restricted to Shields, and Leather is Armor only, while the other 5 are Weapons only. Obviously Damascus and Hagane are the best materials therefore being the rarest. Many a debate suggests that even Iron is more powerful than Silver, but Silver always starts out with high stats against the "supernatural" or Phantoms and Undead. Once you get strong enough in the game, it won't really matter what weapon you use in my opinion.

As far as customization goes, you can never see your armor, can visually see your shield, and can visually see the wide variety in differences of weapons which is really neat. But even more cool IMO, is the fact that you can rename all your weaponry, however you want. If you play or have played this game, here is the list of weapons names I used, and that might get your ideas going for if/when you play the game(again): Category of weapons on the top, "Type of creature weapon was designed for" - "name of weapon".

One-Handed Swords

Dragon - Malachite
Human - Royal Assassin
Undead - Sword of Skelos
Phantom - Illusionary Presence
Evil - Holy Avenger
Beast - Natural Selection

Pole-Arms

Phantom - Psyche
Dragon - Chromium
Human - Pneumonia
Undead - Flatline
Beast - Aspect of Wolf
Evil - Nemesis

Great Axe

Dragon - Onyx
Human - Execution
Undead - Bonecrusher
Phantom - Id Insinuation
Beast - Call of the Wild
Evil - Nightmare

Crossbows

Evil - Shot in the Dark
Dragon - Crossfire
Undead - Still Life
Beast - Force of Nature
Phantom - Bipolar
Human - Hemorrhage

Staves

Dragon - Isaiah
Human - Chronicles
Undead - Revelation
Phantom - Corinthians
Beast - Genesis
Evil - Job

Daggers

Evil - Satan's Kiss
Human - Backstabber
Undead - Fracture
Dragon - Suffocating Breath
Phantom - Delusional
Beast - Snakecharmer

Axe's & Maces

Evil - No Hope
Undead - Purifier
Human - Last Call
Phantom - Elemental Blight
Dragon - Guardian
Beast - Horror of the Woods

For the other 2 weapon categories of Heavy Mace and Great Sword, I used only 1 weapon for each complete category, and did not rename them as they were rare items. The Excalibur - Great Sword and the Hand of Light - Heavy Mace. Of course Bare Hands weapon category you can't rename or name anything as well.

The only other thing amongst the basic information is to tell about Break Arts. There are 4 Break Arts per weapon category including bare hands. Think of them like Limit Breaks but available to be used anytime. They cost use of your own HP to use them in battle, but it's usually a fraction of the damage they deal out. The higher level of break art, the shorter on screen range it's going to have. So a Level 1 Break Art such as Ruination for Pole-Arm is going to have a healthy range, while something like Hex Flux Level 4 for Heavy Mace, you're going to literally have to be right next to them to hit them. Some of the break arts have special effects or trigger different types of status anomalies on the opponents. But most are normal. Double Fang or Dagger Level 3 actually is like attacking twice, or a double damage break art, while Riskbreak or Staff Level 2 or 3 actually reduces your Risk level by the amount of damage dealt.

As far as Break Arts I always thought of them as some kind of cheap maneuver in the game as it seems like nearly free damage. I never used them in my first playthrough but maybe twice to just see what they did, however beating the final boss of the game becomes much easier if you use Break Arts on them. So I won't dispute earlier on how successful they are in defeating some rather difficult enemies.

I notice even now a paragraph ago that I brought up "Risk" and still haven't even explained that. There are so many elements to the game that you'll just pick up naturally on, that it's hard to explain everything. Risk basically is a score that goes up based upon how many times you've used Chain or Defense Abilities or how many times you've attacked. When Risk is low, your chance to hit is high and normal damage is what you'll inflict. When Risk is high, your chance to hit drops, but damage is greatly increased if you do hit the enemy. The higher your Risk though, the easier it is for the enemy to damage you and successfully strike you and vice versa when it's low. It's always best to keep Risk low, but in some cases where you can't, remember...that even when you start Chaining, the first strike or first few might miss, but eventually you will start to hit the enemy.

One last thing to note after mentioning Risk, is that HP/MP go up manually on there own if you sit still or just walk around rooms and not engage in combat, and in contrast Risk level goes down to Zero again.

Advanced Information

At this point if you've read all that and have played the game or would like to try it, one needs to ask themselves about halfway through probably what they'd like to get out of this game. Do you want to play it once for fun, or go for the Perfect File? If you want to play it once, that's awesome and enjoy your time with it. If you want to go for the Perfect File, the remaining information will help you on your way.

Alright in attaining Perfect File you need to know your requirements:

* All Items
* All Spells
* All Titles
* Grand Master Breaker Rank or 100 Million Experience Points

Stat Maxing is not necessary in my opinion for a perfect file and is beyond the beyond for bragging rights. It's just not necessary overall.

In playing for a perfect file there are 2 ways you can go about this, the Fast way or the Slow way. I chose the Slow way rather than the Fast. Fast means in about 2 or 3 playthroughs you can unlock everything and get everything done, while Slow means you continually beat the game over and over at around 12 to 20 times to attain all the Titles and basically get a balanced finish. The only real difference you'll notice in the two is Ashley's statistics after doing both methods. If you do the Fast method your version of Ashley will be much weaker than mine is. You'll have very low stats and in fact, head to head, I'd crush you. Everytime you defeat a boss a slot wheel comes up allowing the chance to raise your statistics in some way. Also everytime through the game you pick up certain Elixir's and Wine's that also raise stats specifically. So basically it's all up to you and there isn't a wrong way to do it, it just depends what you want your ending version of Ashley to be like. N' those of you who think you'll do the fast way then just boost your stats up afterwards, that takes just as long if not longer than just playing it the slow way. Another difference you'll notice is achieving the two painstakingly long titles, Master of Arms and Blood-Thirsty Hunter, when I got everything else done and knew I was on the road to the finish line I had only 12,500 Attacks to make out of 50,000. If you play 3 playthroughs and just rush to get all the other titles, you'll most likely be at 45,500 remaining, and it was boring as hell to get the remaining 12 K so just imagine what 45 K leftover would be like to do. It sounds like I'm suggesting the Slow method, but damn...it to me it just seemed less monotonous over time then the alternative.

Nonetheless let's talk of perfecting this game.

There are 32 Titles you need to Unlock, all with different "specifications". For the best guide at helping you achieve this go to gamefaqs.com and look up Grand Master Breaker Guide by a member named RandomNumbers. He'll tell you the 3 titles that I am now, that will be your real trouble. They are:

Knight of Brilliance - Achieve 30 Chain Attacks In A Row

Blood-Thirsty Hunter - Attack Each Enemy Type 5000 Times

Master of Arms - Attack With Each Weapon Type 5000 Times

The last 2 just take forever, and Knight of Brilliance is just harder than hell. I honestly can't give you anymore help than what RN does at gamefaqs about achieving the KoB. I actually am on that Gamefaq. I sent him an email, asking if he'd add me, because he wanted others to tell him if they've achieved it and by what methods, and he put me on. I also discussed in the email with him a few thoughts I had on it, and they are in his guide.

How did I do it? I got sick and tired of not having it, knew that I could never perfect the game if I don't get it, so I put my foot down and said I'm not leaving this until I get it done. I played for an hour and a half straight on just trying to achieve this and I did. I used a One-Handed Silver Sword called Sweet Death, and teleported between 2 rooms with Training Dummies in them, because they take a ton of hits before dying and never attack back. The rooms are The Blackmarket and The Dark Tunnel. With a Human an Ogre Dummy respectively. I got 31 chains against the Ogre dummy after I got 30 a few minutes before. I'm on that FAQ listed as 1scorpion1, as that is my s/n at gamefaqs. I used Heavy Shot and Raging Ache as they seemed to be the easiest to chain with.

Everyone is different though. Some people can do timing things amazingly good in games. There is a guy that has 139 chains as his best all time, others who have 41, and some who can never do this. I'd say find which Chains you like to use the best, and use a weapon continuously until you do it. Because I think anyone can do it with any weapon, but it has to be something your comfortable with.

If you want perfection at this, you can NEVER give up. One of the hardest gaming accomplishments I've ever done.

The last 2 are just ridiculous, 5,000 Kills and 5,000 Attacks is just a headache. With 6 enemy types that's 30,000 Kills and with 10 weapon types that's 50,000 attacks. Ridiculous. Well my goal of course was to get perfect 5,000 numbers listed on all categories, I'll explain how I did this in the end. The reason was because I didn't want it to look like I worked harder than I did. With like 40,000 Kills and 50,000 Attacks. I wanted everything to be balanced and even. I'll move on for now and end with this discussion as my numerical madness should drive you insane if you've actually even read thus far.

The only last comments I'd like to say in regards to the "Basic Information" is in regards to Ultimate Weapons and Armor. First of all, Ultimate Weapons I still think are pointless. Many people make them because they feel it's somehow like creating Ultimate Weapons in an FF or something. Your making a weapon with stats that won't decrease that will probably do max damage or 999 on all enemies it hits. Well the real reason why so many make them is because of the fact that they LOOK GOLD! That's it, that's really the reason, they just look cool. Well the real deal is that, ALL Damascus material weapons are GOLD! Every one of them, so really them making Ultimate Damascus crap is pointless, they already look gold and I'm telling you...my character can kill anything in the game with 1 hit...without chaining, except for maybe 5 bosses. N' those 5 bosses never even will get a turn because I'll chain once and kill them.

Ultimate Armor? No point, I never can be hit anyway, not even traps do damage to me anymore, and if they do it's below 10 HP loss, so what the hell?

I'm so glad I didn't waste hours creating Armor I'd never even be able to look at, and weapons that I'd never need anyway.

On the comment of Armor though, obviously since that is always a constant for you, as you'll be changing weapons to get all the titles you may want to get the best armor. Well it's kind of confusing and the game surely doesn't tell you how, but the best armor categories are Hoplite, then Jezeraint, then Dread. In order to get them, you need to combine 2 of the same type of the level below and you'll make the higher category of armor. For example 2 Hoplite Leggings = 1 Jezeraint Legging, etc. With that said, whether you're making Ultimate equipment with max stats or whether you'd just like the standard top quality you can get, here is the type of equipment you'll want to pick up to make Dread Armor of all types across the board per category:

Boots

Chain Leggings + Jambeau = Missaglia
Poleyn + Jambeau = Missaglia

Poleyn + Missaglia = Plate Leggings
Poleyn + Fluted Leggings = Plate Leggings
Missaglia + Missaglia = Plate Leggings

Missaglia + Plate Leggings = Fluted Leggings

Fluted Leggings + Plate Leggings = Hoplite Leggings

((I understand this is confusing, if you play the game or have you'd understand or will understand. Basically that is how I'm going to draw this up for each one of these Armor lists. As you can see, you need to find any of the types I've listed and save them, and try to keep combining up. Eventually you'll make 2 Hoplites, then 2 Jezeraint, then you'll have your Dread Leggings, and you have the best Leg Armor you can.

All I really did in these short lists is find the ways to make the hardest pieces of the puzzle, so that I could make the Armor as fast as I can. As you can see, there is only 1 way to make Fluted Leggings for example, but they can be found in the game. Also you can always make multiple Plate Leggings and switch some into Fluted to combine with another Plate to make Hoplite. Once you get good at combining you'll understand all this.))

Gloves

Plate Glove + Rondanche = Tilt Glove

Chain Sleeve + Plate Glove = Rondanche
Chain Sleeve + Freiturnier = Rondanche
Vambrace + Plate Glove = Rondanche

Gauntlet + Fluted Glove = Freturnier
Plate Glove + Fluted Glove = Freiturnier
Tilt Glove + Tilt Glove = Freiturnier

Rondanche + Freiturnier = Fluted Glove

Freiturnier + Fluted Glove = Hoplite Glove

Helmets

Barbut + Burgonet = Armet

Sallet + Barbut = Basinet
Sallet + Armet = Basinet

Basinet + Close Helm = Burgonet

Basinet + Armet = Close Helm

Close Helm + Burgonet = Hoplite Helm

Body Armor

Breastplate + Scale Armor = Brigandine
Segmentata + Scale Armor = Brigandine

Breastplate + Brigandine = Plate Mail
Breastplate + Fluted Armor = Plate Mail
Scale Armor + Brigandine = Plate Mail

Brigandine + Plate Mail = Fluted Armor

Fluted Armor + Plate Mail = Hoplite Armor

Shield

Spiked + Kite = Casserole
Round + Kite = Casserole

Round + Casserole = Heater
Kite + Casserole = Heater

Casserole + Heater = Oval

Oval + Heater = Knight

Oval + Knight = Hoplite

AS STATED IN ALL EXAMPLES 2 HOPLITES = 1 JEZERAINT, 2 JEZERAINTS = 1 DREAD. Simply look for the small pieces and when your inventory gets full of the required items, go into Godhands Workshop or the Junction Point one where you can combine nearly everything if not, and combine them all into higher forms of what you're looking for. Then continue playing and keep picking up what you need as you go. The hardest for me to get was the Helmet, I don't know why, the game would not give me Armet's and such, when I needed them.

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Ok, all I have left is All Items, All Spells, and My Perfect 5000 Challenge/Story.

All Spells: To Acquire all the magic in the game it will require multiple playthroughs. Radial Surge is a Multiple Level Spell that requires the Gold Key for you to even find, unless your lucky and a Lich drops it. Also Grimoire Fleau or Curse can only be received out of a treasure chest with a door locked by the Gold Key, found only in 2nd playthroughs. Lastly, the Dark Eye creatures have all the other rare single creature non-area of effect spells that you need to finish your list. So here is what you need:

Grimoire Radius - Radial Surge - Found in treasure chest in Buried Alive room in the Escapeway, and rarely dropped by a few Liches in the game.

Grimoire Fleau - Curse - Found in treasure chest in Companion In Arms room in the Limestone Quarry.

Gimoire Banish - Banish - Received after killing a specific Harpy monster in the game, and it's a rare drop to. I don't know which one it is, and I'm not looking it up, go to gamefaqs.com and look up the Game Lists FAQ or Magic FAQ more likely, it'll tell you which room this Harpy is in. It's only dropped it once for me in all my playthroughs, it's probably not that rare, I just dunno which one it is exactly. Ok, ok, I had to look back at something, it's the one in the room Arms Against Invaders in the Undercity East.

Grimoire Zephyr - Solid Shock
Grimoire Patir - Dark Chant
Grimoire Incendie - Fireball
Grimoire Teslae - Lightning Bolt
Grimoire Glace - Aqua Blast
Grimoire Terre - Vulcan Lance

^ See those 6 spells above. Wanna know how to get them? When your later in the game and you have Teleportation Magic, go to Undercity West a room called, The Sinner's Corner. In that room there is a Dark Eye that is holding Grimoire Patir for Dark Chant. Now here is the interesting thing, in every room surrounding this one, formating or creating a cross, are room's with 1 Dark Eye and one room with 2 of them. Each Dark Eye holds a different spell. So basically all you have to do is Teleport to the Sinner's Corner, and fight each Dark Eye until you start getting spells. Then once you get one, don't go in that room again, unless you absolutely have to, visit the other one's solely, and finish out your spell collection. In fact, I don't even teleport away, I just go up into Fear of the Fall which is the big square room, and then I enter the new map area and that will refresh all the enemies behind you.

Work the cross, and you'll get all the rare grimoires.

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ALL ITEMS...AHHH!! lol

This is going to be rough to explain but here we go.

Ok first of all if you get or have the strat guide you need to get rid of the myth first. Sydney Losstarot, one of the main NPC's in the game, NEVER drops his sword. Which is simply an Iron Shortsword called Czarine, and you can make it very easily with a few gems that are common and rename it. It's nothing special and I've killed him enough times in a certain battle in the game to know he never drops it. So get that out of your head right now.

The are 10 rare weapons, 8 special 1-Handed Swords that are Rhomphia Blades which are the strongest in the game for 1-Handed. The Excalibur or Holy Win Blade that is the strongest Great Sword in the game, and lastly the Hand of Light with the Blade of the same name which is the strongest Great Mace in the game.

The Hand of Light can be retrieved from any Minotaur monster you fight in the game after the very first one. Which includes the Time Trial one, the Minotaur Lord, and Minotaur Zombie. All 3 continually regenerate, including the Time Trial one, which regen's everytime you walk into fight the Time Trial against him.

Excalibur is held by a Last Crusader in the room Tormentum Insomniae, in the Iron Maiden B3 levels. You can't get here until at least your 2nd playthrough, and when you do, you need to reduce your HP to below 150 HP to even make him appear. When you do, like with all the other Rhomphia blades you'll need to acquire for Item Completion, continue to use Break Arts to keep your HP low. This rare weapon isn't so hard to get though, because Asura herself is in the next room to this, or The Iron Maiden room, and that is also a level or area change. Meaning that you can simply kill her, then go back and forth between Tormentum Insomniae and The Iron Maiden to keep killing the Crusader until he drops this weapon. The Excalibur also carries the Arturos and Berial Blackpearl gems which are rare and are only found on this weapon.

The 8 Rhomphia's:

Isolde
Sarnga
Brionac
Dainslaif
Ascalon
Pinaka
Izanagi
Mjolnir

All of these weapons I'll tell about in a second and let you know that each one of them carries very rare gems, that you'll need for item completion as well, so you're really killing two birds with 1 stone a lot of the time. The guide lists where to find Beowulf and Balvus, 2 rare gems by themselves, but you can't get them until a 2nd playthrough at least, just so you know, there in the same treasure chest as the Grimoire Fleau listed above in the rare spells section.

Isolde like all the Rhomphia's, is being carried by a Crusader, and in all rooms while trying to get these...remember below 150 HP! This one can be found in the room Tablillas, which is the Iron Maiden lower levels...where all of these are. This carries the rare gem Tertia.

Sarnga this is in the room called The Rack, and carries the Vedivier rare gem.

Brionac this is in the room called The Eunics Lot, and carries the rare gem Sigguld.

Dainslaif this is in the room called Brank, and carries Lancer one of the rare gems.

Ascalon this is in the room called The Spider, and is equipped with Gervin, one of the rare gems.

Pinaka this is in the room called The Mind Burns, and carries Galerian, a rare gem.

Izanagi this is in the room called The Cold's Bridle, and carries Berion, a rare gem.

Mjolnir this is in the room The Oven At Neisse and carries Altema and Basivalen, both rare gems.

The only thing I can help with at this point is to suggest PATIENCE, as these take a lil while to get. Took me maybe a few hours for 2 days to get them all, and sometimes was frustrating, especially when you get down to 1 sword left. But stay at it, and if you get any extra's like I did(3), bonus for you. My strategy was simply to focus on 4 at a time, and basically go back and forth between those rooms until I got one of them. Then extend my search to the next nearest room further in, that had the next rare sword. This strat worked very well, and I got them all fairly fast as I said.

Lastly for Rare Items, you'll need the rare accessories, and there are a few, nothing overly dramatic but a few to get. The name, location, and creature to fight are listed below.

Agrippa's Choker this can be found in several rooms, The Mind Burns, The Spider, Squassation, and the Lead Sprinkler. A Shrieker in each one of these rooms has this item as a rare drop. But you need to have OVER 150 HP to make them appear and not another Crusader.

Balam Ring this can be found near the very end of the Iron Maiden after you fight Asura. It's being held by a Lich Lord in the room St. Elmo's Belt.

Cross Choker this is being held by the Ogre Lord in Tormentum Insomniae, which you'll need OVER 150 HP for him to appear, and not the Crusader carrying the Excalibur.

Faufnir's Tear this is carried by a Lich Lord in one of two rooms in the Iron Maiden, either The Strappado, or Dunking The Witch near the end.

Lau Fei's Armlet this is being carried by an Ogre in the room The Rack. You'll need OVER 150 HP again to make him appear and not a crusader carrying Sarnga though.

Marlene's Ring best item in the game. Carried by Asura herself...ONLY in the Time Trial battle though.

Morgan's Nails the item that took the longest for me to acquire...500 battles. It's all probability, that's all. This is retrieved from the battle with Death in the Time Trial.

Nimje Coif of course in the Iron Maiden you fought both Death & the Ogre Zombie at the same time, and you'll do it again here in the Time Trials. The Ogre Zombie like Death is carrying a rare item, and they only drop them in these Time Trial battles.

Palolo's Ring this can be found in 2 places in the game. You can either get it from an Earth Elemental in The Darkness Drinks which is in the Escapeway, or you can get from a Lich Lord in Salvation for the Mother in the Undercity West. I recommend the Lich Lord as the drop rate is higher, but then again...the EE is right next to an exit so you can easily respawn him over and over to get it from him.

Rusted Nails you can get this item from 1 of 2 locations as well. It's carried by a Lich in either Corner of the Wretched or Larder for a Lean Winter, both locations in the Undercity West.

Talian Ring this can only be retrieved from Death in the room Bite the Master's Wounds in the Undercity West. What's weird is that if you have over 225 HP I think it was, the only Death that appears in the room, is the one that carries this item. If you come in with less HP, there will be 2 deaths, and the other one doesn't have it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Lastly...the Perfect 5000 Strategy/Challenge

Ok first of all, what I was trying to do by doing the Slow method was basically figure how much experience I was getting per game or lets say variable A x how many games it would take to get to 100 million. It was 3.9 million experience per playthrough, or value A. Therefore I tried to get about 2 Titles per playthrough to finish out perfectly at 100 million experience points, which looked to be about 16 playthroughs.

However I needed to get the last 2 titles which I always knew they'd be last which was Blood-Thirsty Hunter and Master of Arms. So here is the mathematical problem:

B1 + B2 + B3 + B4 + B5 + B6 = 30,000 and C1 + C2 + C3 + C4 + C5 + C6 + C7 + C8 + C9 + C10 = 50,000

Both B# and C# all equal 5,000.

However after a single playthrough B1 - B6 will go up a total of 715 points randomly and not evenly and C1 - C10 will go up about 1500 points randomly and not evenly.

So how do you solve this problem?

The answer is isolating targets.

However there was another problem. After 4 to 5 playthroughs I realized that what I previously feared of getting too many attacks and not as many kills wasn't even the problem here. There was a variable that I wasn't even considering yet...Ashley getting stronger, and being able to kill quicker. So on my 5th playthrough I realized that Ashley had only a gap of 3,500 between Kills and Attacks. With the totals being 30,000 and 50,000, this is a huge problem as the GAP in itself between the two, needs to be 20,000 points wide.

So what do I do?

Well I went up to Training Dummies endlessly, for about 3 to 4 weapon styles, and basically wasted all my attacks, after mastering the Break Arts in those categories to achieve a Gap of 20,000 points. Then I held that gap for the rest of the game. Now if the Gap ever changed off hand, I basically modified or adapted to fix the problem. Meaning if the gap was below 20 K I attacked a few dummies to raise my Attack count and if it was higher than 20 K, I used magic to kill a few enemies, raising the Kill count.

What really happened to me is that I created the gap, kept on my 2 titles per game thing, until I reached about 95 million experience and realized how the experience is given in the game. I thought for the longest time it was just about killing bosses as that is when it shows you that you raise experience, however that isn't true. You raise experience from so many things it's ridiculous including every kill on every monster you make. And if you use the same weapon on the same monster, the experience keeps getting higher and higher to a point that's ridiculous. I was getting 15 K experience points for killing a single Dark Elemental - Phantom with a Great Axe that I used continually against Phantom enemies. I raised my experience 5 million points alone on this creature. So experience in itself is not something to worry so much about, as I ended up with 30 Million over than expected. I don't know how to basically recalculate this to make you end up at 100 million even or really close to, but I'd suggest about 12 playthroughs and see if you can finish it all in that time.

In order to end up with perfect 5,000 number in kills and attacks though, you definitely need to make the "GAP". Turn off your chain abilities or simply don't use them, I turned them off to make it easier. Then go to a training dummy with whatever weapon category your working on and keep hitting the O button endlessly. You'll keep attacking and each attack basically is raising the Gap by 1 point. Dummies have 999 HP and unless your weapon has over an 80 Affinity score towards that type of creature it'll get 250 + attacks for each time you kill 1 of them.

When you have the gap of 20,000, now you need to finish out the kill list. Basically when I got to that point I kept focusing on the lowest number of kill's in a group and tried to raise that. I'll list the best locations to raise each group and then singular areas to fight solely that type of monster, than I'm going to end this neverending thread.

Dragons: I personally liked City Walls North simply because it had all the other types of enemies around there except Undead, and yet Dragon was raising higher than any of them, so it helped in balancing.

Undead: Start at Rue Bouquet and go through certain rooms in Undercity West until you reach Sinner's Corner, then Teleport back to Rue Bouquet and start over. This should get you about 37 Undead kills and 5 Phantom and 5 Evil.

Evil: Obviously the Iron Maiden is perfect for this if you plan on doing big hunts. Even with your HP high you can get at least 19 + Evil kills per trip through area changes and very few of anything else which will most likely be Beast.

Beast: Honestly kind of a tough one to figure out. If you go to the Blackmarket and work your way to the Hall of Sworn Revenge in the Catacombs you'll end up with like 19 Beast 10 Undead and like 1 Evil kill. So I think this is the best area for Beast.

Human: The Treaty Room in the Abandoned Mines B2. Go there kill the 3 slimes, then go back two rooms and kill 5 human enemies, then go through the Abandoned Mines, you'll have 52 kills per trip total and 27 or more of them are Human, a few being Beast, a few being Evil, and 1 Dragon.

Phantom: This is the worst one, because there really isn't any good place to string phantom kills in a row that doesn't affect or raise other kill groups as well. Honestly this one I use for both Singular and group killings, at the end of City Walls North is the room Traces of Invasion Past, and right next to that is Undercity East's The Greengrocer's Stair. Go back and forth between the two and fight the Dark Elemental Phantom to raise Phantom kills.

Ok, so now you're wondering how to finish it out...

Well my last weapon category was Heavy Mace, using the Hand of Light which was nice, as I didn't have to switch weapons anymore. Basically each 1,000 of Attacks, I kept reducing the "hunt" amount, the first 0 to 1 K I hunted 300 enemies, then 1 to 2 K it was 200, then 2 to 3 K it was 100, then 3 to 4 K it was 50, and from 4 to the final 5 K I used a slim margin of 25 kills/attacks until I got to 4900 Attacks, and then knew it was time to end this. So here is the SINGULAR areas to kill enemies of each type should you choose.

First, never end with Phantom unless you have to, you do fight some during an Undead Hunt and at the end if Beast actually gets behind, you can find a few in the Snowfly Forest. But catch that one up to a point where you can finish it off without trying. The rest are easy as pie:

Dragon: I ended with this one and it's so easy. Teleport to the Wood Gate in the Snowfly Forest and walk into City Walls South, Dragon enemies are all you'll find in here.

Undead: If you need to kill these specific you can easily teleport to The Sunless Way in the Undercity West and they are in every surrounding room from that.

Beast: This one made me think in the end, but I ended this one and Phantom perfectly by going straight up in the Snowfly Forest which gave me 8 Beast Kills to 1 Phantom kill and 2 Undead Kills if you wanted them across the Forest River room.

Evil: Like with the big Undead Hunt, go to Rue Bouquet and then Glacialdra Kirk Ruins, then enter the door locked with the Rood Inverse. Go straight instead of curving from the second room you enter and go into the Escapeway. You should get 10 or 11 Kills of Evil to 1 Phantom Kill if I remember correctly. Or it's just straight Evil with no competition.

Human: Umm...I can't even remember offhand, this one is so easy, just teleport to any main Town area and fight off the Crimson Knights. The Keep is a perfect place then go and hunt through Town Center South.

I challenge anyone to get perfect 5,000 as I did, but then again...I just told you how, so it's not that hard is it?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Anyways to the very limited few of maybe 2 who read all this, thank you, this game was fun, challenging, and worth perfecting.

I AM THE VAGRANT

[Georg Prime]

Has anyone ever played it? I have played it, but haven't beaten it as of yet. I've gotten too sidetracked by other games.

Did you like it/not like it, didn't like the reviews simply and never gave it a try? I liked it a lot, it was a unique game that provided a fresh change than other games I was playing.

If you did play it, what did you think were the games greatest pro's and is there any cons or things that you would have rather changed?

Pros:
1. Great Graphics (IMO this game and Chrono Cross are two best looking PS games. This more for the technical aspect, and Chrono Cross more for the artistic aspect. Had great animation and special effects as well.
2. Awesome Battle System
3. Deep Gameplay(i.e. weapon customizing, etc)
4. Challenging (i guess this could be a pro or con depending on how you look at it)
5. Great Audio Not only does this have a great soundtrack, but its use of sound effects really add to the mood of the game.
6. Gripping Storyline The FF Tactics team are great storytellers, and this to me is their greatest one yet (though we'll see how FF XII is). To top it off the use of in-game cinematics really helps draw you in. It's like a living comic book or something
7. Replay As you pointed out the game has tons of replay and you can really take the time to master it all if you want to.
8. Great Boss Battles The bosses were big, challenging, but most of all a hell of a lot of fun to play.
Cons
1. Complex Interface I guess getting to know how to do everything can take some time though once you learn everything it's not too much of a problem.
2. Recycled Textures While this isn't a big problem, most of what i have played so far the environents are a dingy brown. There are a few parts where you can out of the dungeon and come outside, but i would have liked to seen more of a variety and maybe even some towns?

..thats all i can really think of. I've heard the main quest is pretty short but i have yet to beat it so I can't really comment on that.

[Leviathan]

I am definitely one of the few who would read it and I have. Your knowledge of this game is extensive. Just reading your post is making me feel nostalgic, I want to experience it once more. I think I shall do. I'll start the game again on Monday, maybe tomorrow.

I have never attempted to perfectly master the entire game. In all honesty the last time I played it i raced through the game destroying everthing in my wake, but got ****ed up by Guildenstern's second form when he did Bloody Sin.

My character was too weak and I could not work out why. I had 333HP by the end of the normal game. My weapons were in no way incredible but they minced everything in the game aside from Guildenstern.

[Omega]

Leviathan, all I can suggest is that you have Demonscale and you HAVE to get that timing right, which is when the camera zooms in on Ashley's face during Blood Sin, or you're probably gonna die.

Just a bit more knowledge on some things:

Ultimate Armor: The real reason why I didn't do the armor, or shall we say one of the many, but the number one reason. Was practicality. For example, I got all the Dread on like my 8th playthrough right. Well in creating it I was thinking, why create ultimate armor? I'm going to go through the game again and again anyway right? So eventually over time I'm going to build up affinities to everything, as you ALWAYS seem to gain more points indifference to losing them on the spread. Regardless of loss/gain, I'm fighting the same monsters and facing the same traps over and over again. Therefore I don't need to really make it all perfect 100's, as nothing is going to hit me anyway after a few playthroughs. And more and more each game, I barely ever got hit, to the last few where traps aren't even damaging me.

Ways to die that you didn't know: Dunno if you did or not, but here ya go. First of all, if you're poisoned, you need to remove it. It never seems to go away on it's own, and unlike other traps, as there is a poison trap, this is the only type that CAN kill you, as poision can take you to 0 HP.

The other thing is falling in the holes. It takes 20 HP off you each time you fall, if you have below 20 HP, and you fall in a hole, you will die and get a game over screen.

2 lessons I learned the hard way.

Knight of Brilliance: this title intimidates a lot of people and it might have to me as well just a lil bit, but not much. One theory I had that proved to be true for me, was just simple consistent use of a weapon type. As I told you I went through that first game with 6 different weapon types right. Well in doing so, I found out which weapons I was really good at and which one's I wasn't so good at. I honestly got 21 chains with Crossbow, Dagger, and perhaps even 24 with Pole-Arm. However I rolled randomly some dice and the next playthrough was going to be One-Handed Swords, or that was the first category of weapons that I was going to master.

So I beat the 2nd playthrough and was thinking of my theory...I bet anyone can do it with anyone as long as they get good at it. So on my 3rd playthrough I put my foot down, and got it with the One-Handed Sword. The reason why, is as I said, you just get used to the motions and style of using the weapon.

All the smaller weapons attack the same way. The only one's that change somewhat are the larger weapons. For example Heavy Mace, if you attack from a fair range, Ashley will sweep it in an arc in front of him in a 180 degree manner. If however Ashley is really close to the enemy, he'll bring it over the top of his head and do a diagonal overhead slash. So basically if your going to use a larger weapon with a slower more steadier chaining rhythm, remember to get your range right and stay consistent with that, so you don't confuse yourself.

Armor Pieces I Showed Combinations For: I really want to stress that if your trying to get Ultimate Dread or Dread as I did, that you really only need these pieces per category. Don't sit there and pick up every little helmet out there in a thought of upgrading it to a lowly piece on that scale. I've brought them to a point where you can find them regularly, and you only NEED what I listed. So stick with those if your going for Dread.

Originally Posted by Cobain

Armor and Weapons all come in several different types of material which are Leather, Bronze, Iron, Silver, Hagane, and Damascus. Wood might be an option as well, but is restricted to Shields, and Leather is Armor only, while the other 5 are Weapons only.

I want to clarify this:

Wood is Shield ONLY

Leather is Armor ONLY

The other 5 are in all categories, Weapon, Armor, and Shield.

Originally Posted by Cobain

Dragons: I personally liked City Walls North simply because it had all the other types of enemies around there except Undead, and yet Dragon was raising higher than any of them, so it helped in balancing.

What I meant by balancing here, is basically getting all the Kill counts to level or get close to each other, so it wouldn't be hard to finish them off, as none would be dramatically lower than the other on the list. I got them all within 100 points of each other, before I even started Heavy Mace, so it was smooth sailing from there.

The area listed for Dragons as I said, raised Dragons the highest, and very minimally raised the others, as Dragon was trying to catch up with the others. So it worked out very well.

Originally Posted by Cobain

Phantom: This is the worst one, because there really isn't any good place to string phantom kills in a row that doesn't affect or raise other kill groups as well. Honestly this one I use for both Singular and group killings, at the end of City Walls North is the room Traces of Invasion Past, and right next to that is Undercity East's The Greengrocer's Stair. Go back and forth between the two and fight the Dark Elemental Phantom to raise Phantom kills.

This creature right here, is the real reason my experience level got screwed up. As the bonuses just keep getting higher and higher for repeated killings of the SAME monster with the SAME weapon. It's all an experience formula, and it's link can be found in the Grand Master Breaker guide at gamefaqs.com.

Riskbreaker Rank: I do want to specify that the last 3 Riskbreaker ranks are TITLE dependant as well as experience point level. It's either 8, 12, 16 of the first 16 titles, or 12, 14, 16 of the first 16 titles that need to be acquired before you can reach Level 14 Radiant Knight then Level 15 Grand Paladin, then Level 16 Grand Master Breaker.

I got 14 and 15 no problem, but I did get over 100 Million experience points before the game gave me Level 16, as I still hadn't finished out Title 15 which was Master all Break Arts, since I did each weapon category one at a time.

Just something to remember, should you go for Grand Master Breaker.

Probability: If you ever are searching for the rare items and are curious as to what your chances of them dropping them are. You can go to the Enemy FAQ at gamefaqs and find the creature in the specific room that is carrying that item. It will list a value, most of the time for the rares it's 8. That means the computer chooses a random number out of 256 and if it's 1 to 8, that rare item is dropped. I calculated this at one point down to 3.12% chance.

However you have to realize here that the game can use the same number over and over. It doesn't mean you'll fight 100 of the creature type and they'll drop 3 of the rare item. It's all just random chance. As the cpu could roll:

5
29
150
222
64
63
63
3

For example as I said about the Death & Ogre Zombie Time Trial Battle, I had to do it 500 times probably, because Death would not get the right number for the Morgan's Nails drop and the Nimje Coif... WHICH has the same drop rate, came up 3 times. So this was the only really hard item for me to get.

However more probability...I got the Nail's right...then walked across the hall, fought Asura once, then fought her again, and she dropped Marlene's Ring. I got 2 extremely rare items in 3 battles.

So probability can help you sometimes and hurt you others. It's all chance.

Gems: I didn't list Orlandu and Ogmius, two more rare gems in the game. However if you are on your 2nd playthrough and are going deeper into the Iron Maiden, you should have already got them. As they are in the treasure chests in the Forgotten Passageway, where the Damascus Golem is.

Lastly, Beowulf and Balvus don't appear in the chest in the room Companion With Arms, in the Limestone Quarry, because they are on the Great Sword in that chest. So you won't see them initially...but they're on the sword.

[T.G. Oskar]

Hey, Cobain, have you tried making a FAQ out of this? Sweet info you got there, it deserves a nicely done and redacted FAQ.

I do recall you haven't observed the care in getting Jazeraint/Dread armor. Both are not that hard to get, but still it'll take a load of tries (just get the Hoplite set they give you at Great Cathedral...it serves a lot). As far as I have seen, Jazeraint + Silver is good for those magic lovers, while Damascus + Dread seems to be the ultimate physical armor. I can't recall that well, but I tend to associate that way.

Nice assortment of weapon names. Very original. I have quite the skill in renaming weaponry, though these names are awesome. Especially the staves. I wish I had the naming skill of the Vikings: romantic names for weapons, such as "Beard Shaver" for a sharp head-bopping axe.

I still mention it, and I know that's probably the only thing Lev and I agree: one of the best VS assets, hands on, is that darn Guildenstern. I bet he writes a treatise about villains, and we see more interesting stories every now and then.

One final thing: admirable to get that time in reaching the best possible Ashley ever. I got close to the 30-hit combo (I think I did once or twice), but with the dummies. Only way to kill them, and they drop Vera Items and Cure Items. Plus, there's one for each type, so it gets easier to make those weapons.

[Omega]

Originally Posted by T.G. Oskar

Hey, Cobain, have you tried making a FAQ out of this? Sweet info you got there, it deserves a nicely done and redacted FAQ.

I thought about it, I'm just unsure as to whether my structure is ok or not, of if I'd need an editor to compile that with headers to give me a more organized look.

Originally Posted by T.G. Oskar

I do recall you haven't observed the care in getting Jazeraint/Dread armor. Both are not that hard to get, but still it'll take a load of tries (just get the Hoplite set they give you at Great Cathedral...it serves a lot). As far as I have seen, Jazeraint + Silver is good for those magic lovers, while Damascus + Dread seems to be the ultimate physical armor. I can't recall that well, but I tend to associate that way.

Well I do have a full set of Dread as I explained how to create them. However I didn't make it a specific material type or shall I say, ALL Damascus for example. As I just didn't care to waste that much time on it, and I can't be hit anyway since my affinities raised a lot as well as my character stats/attributes.

Thank you for the rest of your kind comments.

Here is something that might interest some of you folk:

Iron Maiden: Some of you may or may not know that the Iron Maiden is a torture device, and then I read somewhere that every room of the Iron Maiden is named after either an Iron Maiden song or after a method of torture. So many of the rooms, I had no idea what they were. So if anyone is interested in finding out what the torture method types are, this website I found a month or so ago lists alot of them and explains them pretty well.

NO, I'm not a freak, I just was curious as to what a Strappado or things like that were, since I'd never heard the word before in my life.

Here:

http://www.shanmonster.com/witch/torture/index.html

Another question:

Has anyone ever charmed an enemy? Ya know, when you keep casting heal on them, then they get a heart over there head and in the room your in, they will fight for you.

I personally never have done it, as I simply forgot near the end, but I'll check it out unless someone tells me it's totally stupid.

EDIT: I just got added to another webpage for completion of the Grand Master Breaker title. The page doesn't always show up due to bandwith issues or the amount of views a day the webpage can have. But here is the link to page 3, and I'm on the bottom of the list, listed as 1scorpion1, which is my gamefaqs s/n again.

http://www.geocities.com/randyattacks/vs/gmb3.html