Let's Play Golden Sun!

[IntegerZero]

I've beaten both games with single djinn classes on the entire time. For Doom Dragon and Dullahan, I resorted to cheap strategies (hi there summon rush of Charon, Isis and Daedalus). But I've also beaten them by switching around my classes and as long as you know how to deal with the random encounters well, you'll be fine.

Yeah, I know I will be. I beat these games doing nothing but summoning and Djinn and items. (Not kidding. Was a blast.)

[Acacia Sgt]

I'm looking at elemental levels. Guard/Soldier allows Garet to rape a lot of Mercury Lighthouse but he also takes more damage since Fire is weak to Water (and strong against it). Brute/Ruffian will actually mitigate some of the damage that Garet takes in the lighthouse thanks to its dual Earth/Fire affinity.

Actually, in the mono classes he takes more damage from Venus than Mercury. In fact, for the mono classes, it's not the opposite element but rather the symbiotic element that they take more damage from.

[Life]

Actually, in the mono classes he takes more damage from Venus than Mercury. In fact, for the mono classes, it's not the opposite element but rather the symbiotic element that they take more damage from.

Then why do I keep seeing !!! after water attacks on a mono-Mars Garet?

[Acacia Sgt]

Then why do I keep seeing !!! after water attacks on a mono-Mars Garet?

Really? That's strange... I've always seen the !!! on Venus attacks, and I always use the mono classes.

[IntegerZero]

Since I love you guys so much. Another Update! Also, ImageShack keeps not uploading all my images. Anyone have another website that I could do this?

Chapter 4: Bandits and a Mind Reader

Before I began, I leveled to 4, got Earthquake, and gave Furby Flint. Also, I did the Master Hammlet's leaving event. Sorry bout that. Also upgraded armor and gave Furby an Axe. No upgrade for Roxas yet.

Yes it was. You wouldn't believe what caused it.

Chick: What did?

If I told you, I would have to kill you...

Chick: Oh...

Sorry bout that.

Dude: Why are you apologizing?

I just had to repair my rook a few day's ago among other things. Yeah...

Dude: Yeah it sucks. Damn eruptions.

No actually, but now that you say that, I am.

Suspicious dude: Well we didn't!

Riiiighttt.

See the Djinn in the tree. Ring the bell to move him, but we cannot get him yet. Oh well.

Mints are awesome. AGI increase is sweet. I won't use it for a while, however.

Hey Furby, I found both your nuts. Would yo like them?

Furby: Really Roxas. Grow up.

Hah! And mister stale water drinker is telling me to grow up!

Going into the back of the Major's house... We meet Shade. He's a wind adept. He has mind read. That's all you need to know.

Since I am awesome and a bag chips. I will help.

Shade: Thank very much!

Shade: I can read minds.

No, I find it awesome.

We read Furby's mind for the lulz. He proceeds to freak the fuck out.

Shade GET!

And this is why I love Mind Read...

It gives NPCs more character depth. It also can give some hilarious statements.

Those thieves made out.

Here is proof they are thieves.

You can even read animal minds as well. Cool Psynergy it is.

Damn. Another one bites the dust.

LOL your stuff sucks.

Isn't she jaded about something...

All priests are Adepts by the way. Second floor of the inn the other two thieves will not let us close the gab.

No duh. It's a shame we need proof, since we already know.

Other 2: What do you mean?

Did you read that dudes mind?! What is this I don't even... You know what, whatever...

Yes Furby. That is right.

Continued next post!

[Suichimo]

Straight-Mars Garet should be weakest to Mercury. Venus should be his second strongest element with Jupiter being third.

I pretty much stick to mono-element classes in the first Golden Sun. They're all fairly good, except Garet, and a Pure Wish from a max Mercury Mia will pretty much keep your party at full HP forever. Not too mention, its much easier to use summons that way and they are much more powerful.

Its much easier to use the multi-element classes in TLA because you start to become able to rely on your weapons' Howls rather than Psynergy and Summoning.

[IntegerZero]

About the Satarous thing. I will check when I get to him. Moving on:

Good idea.

Round two you sons of bitches. Furby, guard the exit. Shade, let's do this.

Trapping them is pathetic. Go to the top and go left. Done. Shade does some extensive mind reading and concludes that they are the thieves. Also, the loot is in the end.

Up here I assume.

Moving the box.

This dude was tied up, but we fixed that.

And here they are. Losers they are. They talk about Hammlet going to Lunpa and that he is screwed. (He is) and the compare themselves to the dudes up there.

Really? That doesn't mean jack. You took stuff that isn't yours and you will be punished.

Thieves: Even of we apologize?

Nope.

Dicks to the end. Autobots! Roll out!

Furby: Roxas you all right?

I''m fine I promise.

Here is our fist boss fight. A Bandit and two thieves. They aren't to difficult, being the first boss and all. They use smoke balls, which cause delusion, decreasing accuracy by a truckload, and use herbs on each other. If they do anything else, who cares they died too fast.

Shade's Psynergy.

Ray.

Great Damage all around. the three !!! means they are weak to it.

And whirlwind.

Also, here is a sleep bomb. Puts enemies to sleep. It even works on them.

A few Rays and beatings later...

We kicked your asses is what happened.

Your faith is touching.

Go Furby. Other dudes come in after and see the proof.

This guy tries to justify themselves. Ha. They throw them in jail and get the loot. They also talk more about how Lunpa is bad and Shade, worried, parts ways to try and rescue them. We won't be going to Lunpa yet. But we will free Shade's master. Mayor wants to give us a reward before we leave too.

He Furby I got your bone as well. You might want this back,

Furby: Roxas!

The dog wants that bone. We comply.

Also, the Bandit's Sword. It has the first unleash of the game. Everyone but Fia can use it.

He douche bags. Enjoying your stay?

Bandit: We won't forget this! We will get revenge on you!

Furby: Sure you will. Whatever helps you three sleep at night.

The Major gives us a Water of Life. It is the item equivalent of revive and are fairly rare. Use sparingly. And that's it for this update! Tune in next time for Chapter 5: Goma Range and Beyond!

Also one more class review!

Beserker (Brute, Ruffian, Savage, Barbarian, Beserker)

To be honest. I'm not a fan of this family. I will try them out more on this run, because I always forget that they get ridiculous attack. Early game they are only good for growth and slight ATK boost. Everything else is fail. They get Average Psynergy mostly. Planet Diver and Revive is pretty awesome though. Haunt, Curse, and Condemn are mostly useless. All attacking Psynergy. bar Diver is useless due to low PP. I cannot say much about this class. Not enough experience with it

The Lost Age: Meet Chaos Lord. Highest boost to attack bar none if I remember correctly. They also give great agility. They are held back by the shitty luck and low PP. Also Planet Diver becomes Planetary. More damage on top of high attack. These guys are top tier Physical fighters. Odd that I love Chaos Lords but not the lower end classes. Oh well.

Arena/Link Play: High attack plus agility plus Planetary equals pain.

I say 7.0/10

EDIT: Guess the references I make in my posts. Two should be obvious, but one is obscure, and if you get it. cool points to you.

Edited September 13, 2010 by IntegerZero

[Life]

Since you're going Tret first, here's what should probably happen (my opinion only) up until he dies.

Ivan should get Flint and become your full time healer since Squire!Issac only has an 80% class bonus in PP vs. Seer!Ivan's 130%. This one is a no contest. This frees up Issac to use Earthquake and Spire on multiple targets. Garet then gets Forge and Issac gets Gust on standby first and then set once Issac hits level 6 (Gaia). Here's a quick comparison of Squire!Issac and Apprentice!Issac.

Squire - HP 110% - PP 80% - Att 110% - Def 100% - Agi 110% - Luck 100%

Apprentice - HP 100% - PP 120% - Att 110% - Def 100% - Agi 120% - Luck 80% (1 Wind)

Squire Psynergy:

1 - Cure

2 - Quake (12 Dam - 4 PP)

4 - Earthquake (35 Dam - 7 PP)

6 - Spire (40 Dam - 5 PP)

Apprentice Psynergy:

1 - Delude

6 - Gaia (40 Dam - 7 PP)

Apprentice!Issac has better overall stats but what I'm specifically looking at is that 40% discrepancy between PP. He loses out on HP and Luck (he gets poisoned more often, so what?) but they're not big loses. The problem comes with Psynergy. Issac has a better range as a Squire but doesn't have enough PP to constantly use them. Gaia also has the same power (40) as Spire, Squire!Issac's best move while only costing 2 more PP (this is where you consider that 40% PP gap). So once Issac hits level 6, he should be an Apprentice.

The next Djinni you get is Granite, a Venus. Put that one on Ivan too to get these results:

Wind Seer - HP 80% - PP 140% - Att 80% - Def 90% - Agi 130% - Luck 110%

Seer - HP 90% - PP 130% - Att 90% - Def 90% - Agi 110% - Luck 100% (1 Earth)

Diviner - HP 110% - PP 140% - Att 100% - Def 100% - Agi 120% - Luck 100% (2 Earth)

Wind Seer Psynergy:

1 - Whirlwind (20 Dam - 5 PP)

4 - Ray (35 Dam - 6 PP)

Diviner Psynergy:

1 - Cure

2 - Bolt (20 Dam - 4 PP)

3 - Growth (25 Dam - 4 PP)

6 - Flash Bolt (40 Dam - 7 PP)

Diviner gives Ivan Cure (with 2 Venus, he heals an extra 10% thanks to elemental powers), a little bit of defense from Earth based attacks (-5% from Magic, -2.5% from EPAs) and better attacking Psynergy. Wind Seer offers him nothing good right now and is much weaker defensively.

And the second Jupiter (Breeze) can go to either Issac or Garet. Page!Garet's looking for the stat boosts (+40% PP, +10% Att and +50% Agl against minor loses in HP, Def and Luck) but is strictly a support unit with no attacking Psynergy (only Delude and Ward). As for Illusionist!Issac, he gets minor stat increases across the board from having Breeze set on him but nothing really special.

And that set-up should tide you over until after Tret's done. This should give you minimal headache between now and the end of Tret Tree.

At that point, there is really no need to branch out with your classes. Isaac will have Ragnarok, and you don't want to deprive Mia of those Mercury Djinni as the healing will be extremely helpful.

Couple of problems with this mindset.

1. Issac doesn't get Ragnarok until level 13. We're talking Fushin Temple at the earliest. Not to mention that you're asking him to spam a 7 PP EPA when he doesn't even have a 100% class bonus for PP. Even with 2 Venus Djinni on him, Knight!Issac only has 90% of the PP that he's supposed to have. If he's supposed to have 70 PP, he only has 63. That's a full Ragnarok right there. Apprentice!Issac would have 84 PP in that scenario, giving him a chance to use 3 more Gaias than Ragnaroks for Knight!Issac.

2. With a lot of Mercury Djinni on her, Mia is a great healer. She's just shit at everything else. She has no power, her defense isn't great (it's not like paper thin Ivan but it's kinda close) and all she can do for decent damage is unleashing Sleet and Mist. I'd rather have Ivan be a competant healer and attacker while choosing between Wanderer!Mia (she gets Cure Poison and Restore along with decent Psynergy like Prism and Drench) and Elder!Mia (terrible defense but hilariously strong offense with Impact to boost Garet and Issac along with Prism and Plasma).

Edited September 13, 2010 by Life Admiral

[IntegerZero]

Life getting awesome and technical and being awesome some more. Go life.

Summed your words for you there. Hope you don't mind.

Damn. Seriously. Here's a challange for you to think out. Beat Earth Dragon, without weakening him. Cause if you do. I'm totally doing that.

[Life]

Damn. Seriously. Here's a challange for you to think out. Beat Earth Dragon, without weakening him. Cause if you do. I'm totally doing that.

Maybe I should do an efficient Djinn run of both Golden Sun games... Like what Djinni on who at what time...

What do you mean when you say "without weakening"? And which Dragon? Doom Dragon? Twin Dragon? You can summon rush both of them and take off half their HP in a single turn.

[IntegerZero]

Maybe I should do an efficient Djinn run of both Golden Sun games... Like what Djinni on who at what time...

What do you mean when you say "without weakening"? And which Dragon? Doom Dragon? Twin Dragon? You can summon rush both of them and take off half their HP in a single turn.

Earth Dragon. That random boss you fight to save a village in The Lost Age. Here Lemme look it up...

Earth Serpent my bad. And not weakening completely makes it impossible NVM. I thought there was a way to increase the difficulty of the fight. Maybe only activating half the lights.

[Suichimo]

Couple of problems with this mindset.

1. Issac doesn't get Ragnarok until level 13. We're talking Fushin Temple at the earliest. Not to mention that you're asking him to spam a 7 PP EPA when he doesn't even have a 100% class bonus for PP. Even with 2 Venus Djinni on him, Knight!Issac only has 90% of the PP that he's supposed to have. If he's supposed to have 70 PP, he only has 63. That's a full Ragnarok right there. Apprentice!Issac would have 84 PP in that scenario, giving him a chance to use 3 more Gaias than Ragnaroks for Knight!Issac.

Really? I'm thinking you should be around that level in either Imil or Kolima Forest, depending on the order. Pretty sure that other than getting lost a bit, in both of those places, I didn't linger around to grind any. Since he's doing Tret first, I wouldn't be surprised if he was at 13 by the time he fought Saturos.

And Ragnarok should be absolutely raping Gaia in the damage department as its an EPA, which means it goes off of Isaac's awesome attack AND his Elemental Power, hits weaknesses, and deals centralized damage which generally brings out a higher damage point than area Psynergy. Combine that with a good weapon and even if Isaac runs out of PP he can still keep up his great offense.

If you're fine with depriving Garet of some armor, and who isn't, Isaac gets the Psynergy Armor in Mercury Lighthouse which gives him another 20 PP which will buy him 2-3 more Ragnaroks.

2. With a lot of Mercury Djinni on her, Mia is a great healer. She's just shit at everything else. She has no power, her defense isn't great (it's not like paper thin Ivan but it's kinda close) and all she can do for decent damage is unleashing Sleet and Mist. I'd rather have Ivan be a competant healer and attacker while choosing between Wanderer!Mia (she gets Cure Poison and Restore along with decent Psynergy like Prism and Drench) and Elder!Mia (terrible defense but hilariously strong offense with Impact to boost Garet and Issac along with Prism and Plasma).

If you're going to be using Psynergy, she'll have plenty of power with Tundra. It should be on par with Ivan's Plasma which he gets at 8 with both Jupiter Djinni, and both options are far superior to Ivan using any of his attack Psynergy as a Seer/Diviner. Ivan healing with Cure is laughable as well. He only has 87 Earth Power with 2 Venus Djinni. Mia has 114 Water with two Mercury Djinni, which you will have by the time you get to Saturos. She is beating the crap out of Ivan in healing and you will definitely need it in that fight.

Earth Dragon. That random boss you fight to save a village in The Lost Age. Here Lemme look it up...

Earth Serpent my bad. And not weakening completely makes it impossible NVM. I thought there was a way to increase the difficulty of the fight. Maybe only activating half the lights.

Definitely not possible to beat him without weakening him when you go through on your first playthrough. New Game+ should allow you to do it though, especially if you've hit 99 with your team and have Excaliburs to go around.

[Rhythm]

Since I love you guys so much. Another Update! Also, ImageShack keeps not uploading all my images. Anyone have another website that I could do this?

Try PhotoBucket. It's what I've always used. Haven't had a problem with it at all.

Loving all the tutorials, and I'm looking forward to all the stuff with classes! I didn't know about getting Nuts out of trees with Catch either, heh.

Also, Life's post are extremely informative.

Edited September 13, 2010 by Rhythm

[Life]

Really? I'm thinking you should be around that level in either Imil or Kolima Forest, depending on the order. Pretty sure that other than getting lost a bit, in both of those places, I didn't linger around to grind any. Since he's doing Tret first, I wouldn't be surprised if he was at 13 by the time he fought Saturos.

And Ragnarok should be absolutely raping Gaia in the damage department as its an EPA, which means it goes off of Isaac's awesome attack AND his Elemental Power, hits weaknesses, and deals centralized damage which generally brings out a higher damage point than area Psynergy. Combine that with a good weapon and even if Isaac runs out of PP he can still keep up his great offense.

If you're fine with depriving Garet of some armor, and who isn't, Isaac gets the Psynergy Armor in Mercury Lighthouse which gives him another 20 PP which will buy him 2-3 more Ragnaroks.

I personally always find myself grinding to level 10 outside of Mercury Lighthouse just so I'm the same level as Mia when she joins. The party is level 12 after beating Saturos which means that the first dungeon that we can use Ragnarok in is Fushin Temple... and it's Earth based (sorta).

Also, Ragnarok doesn't do as much as you think when we're facing more than one target. Here's the math.

Relative Power = (User's Power - Target's Resist).

If (Relative Power < -200), Relative Power = -200.

If (Relative Power > 200), Relative Power = 200.

Power Multiplier (EPA) = 1 + Relative Power / 400

Power Multiplier (Psynergy) = 1 + Relative Power / 200

Damage = (Power Multiplier * Dam) * Djinni Boost + 0-3 Random Damage

Squire!Issac has 104 Power with no Venus Djinni and gains 5 Power for every Venus set on him. I have no idea of enemy Resist values though. Let's say that an enemy has... 14 Earth Resist.

Knight!Issac has 2 Venus set. That gives him a Relative Power of 100. That's a 125% Power Multiplier. Ragnarok has 35 Dam. So it does on average about 45 - 48 damage after the Djinni boost to EPA. Or that's at least what my math tells me.

Illusionist!Issac has 0 Venus and 3 Jupiter set. That gives him a Relative Power of 90, a 145% Power Multiplier. Gaia has 40 Dam but suffers an attack penalty as the spell spreads out. It does 61-64 damage to the middle of 3 enemies and about 49-52 damage to the side enemies.

I need to check this out to prove it, though. And I'm too lazy to run through the game until I hit Fushin Temple in order to do that properly.

EDIT: All I did was calculate the Elemental portion of Ragnarok. I'd need the Physical stats too to find the full damage and for that, I need more info than just making up numbers. Like I'd need to know Issac's stats and his equipment at the time.

If you're fine with depriving Garet of some armor, and who isn't, Isaac gets the Psynergy Armor in Mercury Lighthouse which gives him another 20 PP which will buy him 2-3 more Ragnaroks.

While that's a great solution, we could do the same thing to Illusionist!Issac and that's another 2-3 Gaias he can pull off. Illusionist!Issac also gets his own EPA (Astral Blast) 2 levels earlier. The best part about Astral Blast is that it's Wind based, allowing Issac to do effective damage on Earth targets while Ragnarok suffers from that Earth Resist problem.

If you're going to be using Psynergy, she'll have plenty of power with Tundra. It should be on par with Ivan's Plasma which he gets at 8 with both Jupiter Djinni, and both options are far superior to Ivan using any of his attack Psynergy as a Seer/Diviner. Ivan healing with Cure is laughable as well. He only has 87 Earth Power with 2 Venus Djinni. Mia has 114 Water with two Mercury Djinni, which you will have by the time you get to Saturos. She is beating the crap out of Ivan in healing and you will definitely need it in that fight.

Scribe!Mia is barely outdamaging Diviner!Ivan and this is after considering the fact that Mia has 25 extra Water Power. Diviner!Ivan learns Mad Growth at level 12 while Mia starts at level 10 with Tundra. Before level 12, Ivan is using Flash Bolt, which has 40 Dam, costs 7 PP and is Wind (benefitting from that +25 Wind Power that he has). Tundra costs 8 PP and yet only has an extra 5 Dam on Flash Bolt. Once Mad Growth kicks in, its 15 extra Dam on Tundra means that Diviner!Ivan is outdamaging Scribe!Mia quite badly until Mia learns Ice Horn at level 17. That's a good part of the midgame (we're talking about Imil after Mercury Lighthouse to Lama Temple) right there that Ivan is destroying Mia in offense since he controls both Wind and Earth.

As for healing, don't make me laugh. Mia's using Ply (100 base) until level 16. Diviner!Ivan gets Cure Well (150 base) at level 10. Power means nothing when Ivan has a 50 Dam advantage on Mia. At 18, Ivan learns Bind, effectively sealing half of the enemies that you fight for a mere 4 PP. What does Mia have to combat that? Cure Poison? Restore? Oh and Shaman!Ivan learns Revive at level 19 against Cleric!Mia's Wish series (8, 22, 46).

Double post but I'm just going to check if the calculations I have are correct. I actually am doing a speedrun to figure out what's best where.

If you want to see a lot of lazy math, check out the spoiler. I'm not doing calculations for summons and unleashing Djinn, though.

Isaac - Lv 3 Squire - I1

36 Attack

104 Earth Power

Isaac - Lv 3 Squire (1 Venus) - I2

39 Attack

109 Earth Power

Garet - Lv 3 Guard - G1

29 Attack

104 Fire Power

Garet - Lv 3 Brute (1 Venus) - G2

38 Attack

81 Earth Power

Test 1 - Zombie

55 HP

9 Def

25 Earth Resist

7 Fire Resist

Hypothetical:

Isaac (I2) attacks.

Relative attack = 39 Att - 9 Def = 30 RA

Damage = (RA/2) + 0-3 = (30/2) + 0-3 = 15-18 Damage

Garet (G1) attacks.

Relative attack = 29 Att - 9 Def = 20 RA

Damage = (RA/2) + 0-3 = (20/2) + 0-3 = 10-13 Damage

Actual:

Isaac attacks!

Zombie takes 15 damage!

Garet attacks!

Zombie takes 10 damage!

Hypothetical:

Isaac (I2) uses Quake.

Relative Power = 109 Power - 25 Resist = 84 RP

Power Multiplier = 1 + RP/200 = 1 + 84/200 = 1.42

Damage = (PM * Dam) + 0-3 = (1.42 * 12 Dam) + 0-3 = ~17 + 0-3 = 17-20 Damage

Garet (G1) uses Flare.

Relative Power = 104 Power - 7 Resist = 97 RP

Power Multiplier = 1 + RP/200 = 1 + 97/200 = 1.485

Damage = (PM * Dam) + 0-3 = (1.485 * 15 Dam) + 0-3 = ~22 + 0-3 = 22-25 Damage

Actual:

Isaac casts Quake!

Zombie takes 18 damage!

Garet casts Flare!

Zombie takes 25 damage!!!

Test 2 - Slime x2

32 HP

6 Def

42 Earth Resist

Hypothetical:

Isaac (I1) uses Quake on Slime1.

Relative Power = 104 Power - 42 Resist = 62 RP

Power Multiplier = 1 + RP/200 = 1 + 62/200 = 1.31

Damage = (PM * Dam) + 0-3 = (1.31 * 12 Dam) + 0-3 = ~16 + 0-3 = 16-19 Damage to Slime1

Damage to Slime2 = (Damage to Slime1 * 0.80) + 0-3 = (16 * 0.8) + 0-3 = ~12 + 0-3 = 12-15 Damage to Slime2

Garet (G2) uses Growth on Slime2.

Relative Power = 81 Power - 42 Resist = 39 RP

Power Multiplier = 1 + RP/200 = 1 + 39/200 = 1.195

Damage = (PM * Dam) + 0-3 = (1.195 * 25 Dam) + 0-3 = ~30 + 0-3 = 30-33 Damage to Slime2

Actual:

Isaac casts Quake!

Slime1 takes 17 damage!

Slime2 takes 15 damage!

Garet casts Growth!

Slime2 takes 32 damage!

Looks like the formulas are correct. This is pretty nifty, to be honest.

Edited September 14, 2010 by Narga_Rocks

[IntegerZero]

Alright. I'm trying out Photo Bucket, so here goes nothing!

Chapter 5: Goma Range and Beyond.

Last time we stopped petty thieves and regained lost loot, and found out Shade's master is screwed.

We head north to try and help out!

Gate is locked. Into the cave!

Gate in cave is closed too. Damn.

Out of ideas, we head to Goma range.

The stump won't move. We're stumped. Ignore the shitty pun.

Furby: Now what do we do?

I have no idea...

???: Lemme help.

!

Shade to the rescue!

We figured as much. We tried too.

Shade: You did?! Why?

Furby: Roxas mentioned something about robbing the robbers of their good.

Shade: OH! something like Robin Hood right?

Roxas: Suure... ANyways let's go.

They cave is pretty simple on the inside.

These guys are easy. They do something, but I can't remember. Weak to Water I think.

This fight was hilarious. Big parties usually screw shit up early on, but...

Earthquake BTW.

Fire too.

And that's all she wrote. I'm actually surprised I killed all but 1 there. Aslo Ghosts are new. That do Rumble and cast Impair?

Rapid Smash rocks. Roxas like to activate it every other action. Made things significantly easier.

Skeletons hit like trucks in this area. This is probably the second hardest fight. Still easy though.

Before I forget, spire.

Important Item later on.

Fire Djinn! Score. I forgot to snapshot me moving the log here. He is the hardest fight. Basically a mini-boss. Some Djinn have a chance they will flee, which is balls.

And we are out! Short dungeon is short. Into Biblin.

Tree is a dude. THAT is freaky I say.

No one has anything interesting to say, besides that lady McCoy is a bitch and cursed an entire town due to her selfishness. Also that statue of her can be moved.

Inside we find a Wind Djinn! To get him, we have to climb the stairs in the previous picture and follow the top of the wall to the other side, go in the cave, and come down from the left side. No fight this time. Gave the windy to Roxas.

This shop is expensive. I just grab body armor for everyone and call it a day.

Rat Warriors and Bats. They drop smoke bombs and herbs.

I luv Gaia this early. Hits like a truck. That's about it for random encounters though. Boring. Back in town we do something I always skip. You never need to do this, but I am anyways. Pardon the lack of pictures.

We are manly and say we can solve Kolijima's (SP?) curse. We have better chances than all non adepts at least.

ELIXER WOOT!

Damn it! I say that oil drop. It is Flare in item form. Does a little more damage. I don't use Flare anyway.

Entire conversation with Mr. McCoy. He complains, and we're all like dude really?

Yes we can. We are badass mofos you doesn't afraid of anything.

He still has doubts.

I completely agree with you Furby. I completely agree.

He still says no, so the guard drops a hit about the barricade, and LOL we pass it. Boring place, but, do not forget the tree-people there. If you do, someone dies.

Last two pics...

Here is a rat. These things have absurd DEF, as well as crappy HP.

Going here, you get the useless turtle boots. Raises DEF at a massive AGI cost. I'll pass (They give a pretty penny.). Note: Only way to get it in both games.

Also, my current setup is what Life suggested, and I say, it kicks ass. Early game Gaia is WorkTimeFun broken. And Shade makes an excellent healer ue to large PP storage and nobody having lots of HP.

Next time on Chapter 6: The Deku Tree?!!?!?! What is this?! He has a wife?

Also noting. One of each elemental Djinn now. All easy gains.

[IntegerZero]

Double post but I'm just going to check if the calculations I have are correct. I actually am doing a speedrun to figure out what's best where.

If you want to see a lot of lazy math, check out the spoiler. I'm not doing calculations for summons and unleashing Djinn, though.

You should totally log your speed run. DO EET! I can cover all the little parts of the game, while you just be a badass through out it.

[Suichimo]

I personally always find myself grinding to level 10 outside of Mercury Lighthouse just so I'm the same level as Mia when she joins. The party is level 12 after beating Saturos which means that the first dungeon that we can use Ragnarok in is Fushin Temple... and it's Earth based (sorta).

Also, Ragnarok doesn't do as much as you think when we're facing more than one target. Here's the math.

Relative Power = (User's Power - Target's Resist).

If (Relative Power < -200), Relative Power = -200.

If (Relative Power > 200), Relative Power = 200.

Power Multiplier (EPA) = 1 + Relative Power / 400

Power Multiplier (Psynergy) = 1 + Relative Power / 200

Damage = (Power Multiplier * Dam) * Djinni Boost + 0-3 Random Damage

Squire!Issac has 104 Power with no Venus Djinni and gains 5 Power for every Venus set on him. I have no idea of enemy Resist values though. Let's say that an enemy has... 14 Earth Resist.

Knight!Issac has 2 Venus set. That gives him a Relative Power of 100. That's a 125% Power Multiplier. Ragnarok has 35 Dam. So it does on average about 45 - 48 damage after the Djinni boost to EPA. Or that's at least what my math tells me.

Illusionist!Issac has 0 Venus and 3 Jupiter set. That gives him a Relative Power of 90, a 145% Power Multiplier. Gaia has 40 Dam but suffers an attack penalty as the spell spreads out. It does 61-64 damage to the middle of 3 enemies and about 49-52 damage to the side enemies.

I need to check this out to prove it, though. And I'm too lazy to run through the game until I hit Fushin Temple in order to do that properly.

EDIT: All I did was calculate the Elemental portion of Ragnarok. I'd need the Physical stats too to find the full damage and for that, I need more info than just making up numbers. Like I'd need to know Issac's stats and his equipment at the time.

Assuming he switches off between getting 7 and 8 Attack at each level up, Isaac should have 107 base attack. The weapon he'd probably be using around Saturos is the Elven Rapier, +44 Attack, as I don't believe you can get a Claymore or Battle Rapier at this point.

Saturos' stats on the lighthouse are:

HP 1200 Att 113 Agi 51 PP 160 Def 35 Lck 40

He has a flat 100 Earth Resist.

And it helps that the only fight that I'm considering is Saturos on top of the Lighthouse. He's the only target in that fight.

Scribe!Mia is barely outdamaging Diviner!Ivan and this is after considering the fact that Mia has 25 extra Water Power. Diviner!Ivan learns Mad Growth at level 12 while Mia starts at level 10 with Tundra. Before level 12, Ivan is using Flash Bolt, which has 40 Dam, costs 7 PP and is Wind (benefitting from that +25 Wind Power that he has). Tundra costs 8 PP and yet only has an extra 5 Dam on Flash Bolt. Once Mad Growth kicks in, its 15 extra Dam on Tundra means that Diviner!Ivan is outdamaging Scribe!Mia quite badly until Mia learns Ice Horn at level 17. That's a good part of the midgame (we're talking about Imil after Mercury Lighthouse to Lama Temple) right there that Ivan is destroying Mia in offense since he controls both Wind and Earth.

As for healing, don't make me laugh. Mia's using Ply (100 base) until level 16. Diviner!Ivan gets Cure Well (150 base) at level 10. Power means nothing when Ivan has a 50 Dam advantage on Mia. At 18, Ivan learns Bind, effectively sealing half of the enemies that you fight for a mere 4 PP. What does Mia have to combat that? Cure Poison? Restore? Oh and Shaman!Ivan learns Revive at level 19 against Cleric!Mia's Wish series (8, 22, 46).

Mia won't be a Scribe after this as she has other methods of getting the Wish series. However, right now Ply is an extremely cheap heal that Mia should have no problem using turn after turn. It also won't be getting wasted most of the time, like Diviner!Ivan's Cure Well.

Don't even begin to get the idea that any of the status affliction Psynergy are useful at all. They aren't. Either its just normal creatures who you're extending the fight against by using status afflictions on them or its bosses who are virtually immune to them due to their insane luck.

P.S. Integer, if you wanna use a slightly different way of killing enemies, kill the enemies with a Djinni that they are weakest too. This will make them flash and give out more experience, coins, and a higher chance to give items.

[Life]

You should totally log your speed run. DO EET! I can cover all the little parts of the game, while you just be a badass through out it.

Eh... I'm already in the middle of a couple of playthroughs (FE4, FE7, FFVII and ToV). I must have some terrible ADD. Besides, the only thing I'd note are Djinni and equipment set-ups at certain points in the game.

As for Gaia and Ivan being your healer, it's much better than the alternative. But Garet using Growth is also quite nice (30+ damage to Earth strong shit in the beginning of the game? Yes please).

Assuming he switches off between getting 7 and 8 Attack at each level up, Isaac should have 107 base attack. The weapon he'd probably be using around Saturos is the Elven Rapier, +44 Attack, as I don't believe you can get a Claymore or Battle Rapier at this point.

Saturos' stats on the lighthouse are:

HP 1200 Att 113 Agi 51 PP 160 Def 35 Lck 40

He has a flat 100 Earth Resist.

And it helps that the only fight that I'm considering is Saturos on top of the Lighthouse. He's the only target in that fight.

But Isaac doesn't have Ragnarok yet. When I say level 10 at the base of Mercury Lighthouse, this is after Kolima Forest and Tret Tree.

Proto did bring up an excellent point earlier. He suggested to set 1 Mercury on both Isaac and Garet and abuse Cutting Edge, something I've never tried. We'd then end up with Swordsman!Isaac (1 Mercury, 1 Mars), Swordsman!Garet (1 Mercury, 1 Mars), Diviner!Ivan (2 Venus) and Elder!Mia (2 Jupiter). Mia casts Impact on both Isaac and Garet and Saturos dies quickly from 2 Cutting Edges per turn against his 72 Water Resist (surprisingly, Earth is his 2nd lowest Resist). Ivan's on healing duty.

Mia won't be a Scribe after this as she has other methods of getting the Wish series. However, right now Ply is an extremely cheap heal that Mia should have no problem using turn after turn. It also won't be getting wasted most of the time, like Diviner!Ivan's Cure Well.

Don't even begin to get the idea that any of the status affliction Psynergy are useful at all. They aren't. Either its just normal creatures who you're extending the fight against by using status afflictions on them or its bosses who are virtually immune to them due to their insane luck.

There are 3 classes that give Mia the Wish series. Scholar (4+ Mercury), Ascetic (4+ Mars) and Shaman (4+ Venus). The earliest she can use the Wish series is right before the Living Statue at the bottom of Altin Mine. The next two djinni that give her Wish won't be found until after we've killed the Manticore. There's no way I'm gimping her offense and defense just to have Wish ASAP. And don't forget that the Living Statue has 193 Water Resist, almost double his next strongest Resist.

And as for Status Affliction, Bind is probably the only useful one in the game. It's like hitting Silence on an enemy except instead of having a 3 use staff, you have a spammable 4 PP move.

Edited September 14, 2010 by Narga_Rocks

[Suichimo]

But Isaac doesn't have Ragnarok yet. When I say level 10 at the base of Mercury Lighthouse, this is after Kolima Forest and Tret Tree.

Proto did bring up an excellent point earlier. He suggested to set 1 Mercury on both Isaac and Garet and abuse Cutting Edge, something I've never tried. We'd then end up with Swordsman!Isaac (1 Mercury, 1 Mars), Swordsman!Garet (1 Mercury, 1 Mars), Diviner!Ivan (2 Venus) and Elder!Mia (2 Jupiter). Mia casts Impact on both Isaac and Garet and Saturos dies quickly from 2 Cutting Edges per turn against his 72 Water Resist (surprisingly, Earth is his 2nd lowest Resist). Ivan's on healing duty.

I don't think its unreasonable to see your team being around 13 by the time you fight Saturos. But Swordsman does sound better for the fight.

There are 3 classes that give Mia the Wish series. Scholar (4+ Mercury), Ascetic (4+ Mars) and Shaman (4+ Venus). The earliest she can use the Wish series is right before the Living Statue at the bottom of Altin Mine. The next two djinni that give her Wish won't be found until after we've killed the Manticore. There's no way I'm gimping her offense and defense just to have Wish ASAP. And don't forget that the Living Statue has 193 Water Resist, almost double his next strongest Resist.

And as for Status Affliction, Bind is probably the only useful one in the game. It's like hitting Silence on an enemy except instead of having a 3 use staff, you have a spammable 4 PP move.

I would go ahead and completely gimp her offense to get Wish as early as possible. The Wish line of Psynergy is probably the best one in the series so far. Cheap group healing is absolutely phenomenal.

IIRC, the Hydros Statue uses nothing but group attacks so Wish is even more useful there.

I'd still rather just go ahead and straight up kill the enemy in the time it takes to get it Bound.

[Life]

I would go ahead and completely gimp her offense to get Wish as early as possible. The Wish line of Psynergy is probably the best one in the series so far. Cheap group healing is absolutely phenomenal.

And that's where we differ.

[IntegerZero]

P.S. Integer, if you wanna use a slightly different way of killing enemies, kill the enemies with a Djinni that they are weakest too. This will make them flash and give out more experience, coins, and a higher chance to give items.

I am aware of that. I will make great use of it later on, when I start farming for the rare and good drops. And bosses are really the only enemies in the first one you want more exp from. Wonder Birds in the second game however...

Also, I have the next two chapters ready to go, but I'm going to post them tomorrow. I just realized that I have gotten myself addicted to the game again.

[grandjackal]

Man, seeing all this talk about growths and ability power makes me realize I don't know shit about Golden Sun. I just set all elemental djinn to their respective adepts and had a "Screw it, let's do it" mentality to the game. It never came off so hard as to make me want to manipulate growths of the classes like that. Talk about opening my eyes.

...Makes me wish I could find my copy of Golden Sun. I'm such a scatterbrain, constantly losing my stuff...

[Life]

Man, seeing all this talk about growths and ability power makes me realize I don't know shit about Golden Sun. I just set all elemental djinn to their respective adepts and had a "Screw it, let's do it" mentality to the game. It never came off so hard as to make me want to manipulate growths of the classes like that. Talk about opening my eyes.

That's what's great about this game. If you want to customize your team to make your life easier, you can do that. If you don't want to, the game isn't so hard that you're absolutely screwed. That's why Summon Rushes were invented.

EDIT: My findings about Tret are pretty straightforward. Diviner!Ivan makes for a great healer, Apprentice!Isaac should have enough PP to constantly use Gaia but the star of the battle should be a level 8 Page!Garet with Forge (Mars) and Breeze (Jupiter). At level 8, Garet gets Volcano (45 Dam) but gets a huge Power Multiplier thanks to Tret having only 25 Fire Resist (read as Weak too). We're talking about 64-67 damage a turn against Tret's 710 HP from Garet alone. Quite nuts, mind you.

EDIT: Saturos just became so much fun to beat up. Swordsman!Isaac and Garet should spam Cutting Edge, Diviner!Ivan heals with Cure Well and Elder!Mia uses Impact twice each on Isaac and Garet and uses Prism afterwards. Saturos went down in 6 rounds with Isaac and Garet basically doing 100 damage each by Turn 4. However, I did have to grind in Mercury Lighthouse quite a bit to get Garet to level 11 in order to learn Cutting Edge. That pretty much rules out having Ragnarok by this battle.

Edited September 14, 2010 by Life Admiral

[Narga_Rocks]

you seem to be having trouble with the whole "don't double post" thing. When it's only been less than an hour since your last post, why not edit? Even the one with the 5 hour gap may as well have been an edit.

I'm merging your doubles.

[Life]

you seem to be having trouble with the whole "don't double post" thing. When it's only been less than an hour since your last post, why not edit? Even the one with the 5 hour gap may as well have been an edit.

Why? Because I'm an idiot. You know that already, Narga.