Romancing SaGa: Minstrel Song copyright 2005, Square-Enix Romancing Saga Walk Thru Prepared by: Bladewind Draconus ================= Table of Contents ================= search Key Subject =============================================================================== RS000 What is Romancing SaGa? RS001 Characters - List of Playable Characters (To be added) RS001A Albert RS001B Aisha RS001C Gray RS001D Claudia RS001E Jamil RS001F Sif RS001G Hawke RS001H Barbara RS001I Sub-characters Listing RS001J Sub-characters I (Readily Available at start of game) RS001K Sub-characters II (Require quest complete before available) RS001L Temporary/Limited Characters RS001M Mercenary *This section to be contributed by Doomerang & Lordbetshumeletz RS002 Job Classes Description and Skill Lists RS002A Basic Job Listing RS002B Advanced Job Listing RS002C Legendary Job Listing RS002D Weapon Skills Listing RS002E Magic Skills Listing RS002F Map Skills Listing RS003 Basic, Advanced, And Legendary Classes Requirements RS003A Basic Job Class Requirement RS003B Advanced Job Class Requirement RS003C Legendary Job Class Requirement & Location RS004 Proficiencies and Usage RS004A Proficiencies List RS004B How to Use Treasure Map, Find Treasure, and Excavate RS004C How to use Trade RS005 Event Ranks and Events (Quest) RS005A Understanding Event Rank (ER) RS005B New Game+ RS005C How to Tell Your Event Rank RS005D Quest List & their ER Limit RS006 Related Quest Chains (Quest Walkthru) RS006A Terror of the Frontier - The Jewel Beast RS006B Unlocking Darque/Aldora (Secrect Char) & Schirach (Hidden Boss) RS006C Disaster at Melvir, Isle of Evil + Pirate Coast RS006D Of Gecklings, Silver and Moonstone RS006E Treachery in the Dominion RS006F Wanted: Delivery Boy Or Gal (+ Wuhan's brothel) RS006G Ecology 101 RS006H Trouble from the Deep RS006I End Game? RS006J Frozen Secrets RS006K Fatestone Collection RS007 Character Intro Walkthru RS007A Albert (N/A) RS007B Aisha RS007C Gray RS007D Claudia RS007E Jamil (N/A) RS007F Sif (N/A) RS007G Hawke RS007H Barbara RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias RS008 Tempering FAQ & Example RS008A What is Tempering? RS008B How to Temper & How to "Break in" a Weapon RS008C Tempering the Falcata RS008D Best Temperable Weapons List (Include list of all the Best Weapons in Game) RS008E Armor Tempering (Include list of Best Buyable Armor) RS009 Tempering Materials List RS009A Buy-able Tempering Materials RS009B Dropped/Traded Tempering Materials RS009C Tempering Material Statistics RS010 Fusion Magic List RS010A Fusion Spell List and Usage RS010B Imperial Scholar Fusion Formulas (2 spells) RS010C Rosalian Mage Fusion Formulas (3 spells) RS00Q Interesting Questions/Posts from the GameFaq Message Board Q1: Okay,newbie here.And i need help *ASAP* Q2: This game would be MORE FUN if i could do many quests(HELP) Q3: How to make a healer? Q4: RPG Etiquette Q5: What is a Benediction and How to Increase my Favor with the Gods? Q6: OMG!!Jewel beast!! RS00Z Thank You Notes, Legal, etc. Please use the search key to jump to the contents of your choice. If you already have the game, I suggest skipping to 001 and beyond. You will see a lot of "N.B." in my notes, it is abbreviation for "Note Well" in Latin... In other words, pay attention! ============================= RS000 What is Romancing SaGa? ============================= Instead of telling you how badass Cloud/Squall is, Romancing Saga is about a world and the exploits of its heroes. As such, greater empahsis is placed on the deeds of the heroes, than the heroes themselves. And by listening to the minstrel's song as you progress in the story, you will find many intriguing tales, mysteries, and even forewarning of danger (hence the subtitled Minstrel's Songs). To fully appreciate this, one must understand the title of the game: (Source: www.dictionary.com) The definition of Romance in Romancing Saga is: 1) A long medieval narrative in prose or verse that tells of the adventures and heroic exploits of chivalric heroes: an Arthurian romance. 2) A long fictitious tale of heroes and extraordinary or mysterious events, usually set in a distant time or place. 3) The class of literature constituted by such tales. Romancing Saga focus on presenting you with a gorgeous fairy tale world that will open up to you as you quest and explore. Each of the 8 main characters have their own reason to join the good fight, and you get to experience the world thru their eyes. In a way, the world of Romancing SaGa is the main character, and the exploits of the various heroes is the plot development to how spectacular and nostalgic this world is. Comparison between Saga & FF: The original Romancing Saga was released back in Jan. 1992. So it is only fair to compare the story on the level of Final Fantasy IV (Mar. 1991) & FF V (Dec. 1992). (N.B. FFIV = FF2 US, with Cecil & Rosa as the main characters.) Final Fantasy is a linear RPG where the outcome is pre-determined. You view things from the perspective of the main hero, as such, greater emphasis is placed on character developments. Your travel companions are fixed and they come and go as the story dictates (I don't want to take Parom with me, give me Kain! Uhuh, you are getting Parom or you are getting Parom). All the things must be done in a specific order before you can proceed further (no room to screw up). The Romancing Saga Series is a free scenario RPG (Think of those Choose your own adventure books). You see things from the eyes of the 8 heroes separately (think of FF6, when you split up into Locke, Sabin, and Terra branches). Your final objective is to defeat the evil god and you can go about it anyway you want (All 8 of the heroes have their own reasons for beating the boss). You are free to wander and travel the world to gather allies and build up your strength (There is no XP grind in Saga, you get stronger by fighting difficult enemy). Once you have recruited an ally, you can go get them to rejoin your party any time you want (you will not have everyone in the PT at once). So you can choose different allies for difference scenario. Be warned, there are incompatibility between characters, as well as time-sensitive events. So, the difficulty is much greater. Who this game if for: If you are looking for an epic story like FFX or XenoGears, or if you are the perfectionist that only want to get everything done in 1 playthru, you will be sorely disappointed. If you enjoy any of the following games, there is a good chance you will like Romancing Saga. a) Final Fantasy Tactics b) Ogre Battle - March of the Black Queen c) Growlancer d) ChronoCross e) Legend of Mana f) Suikoden g) Radiata Stories h) Star Ocean: The Second Story i) Seiken Densetsu 3 j) Civilization ================ RS001 Characters ================ The 8 Main Characters 1) Albert [RS001A] 2) Aisha [RS001B] 3) Gray [RS001C] 4) Claudia [RS001D] 5) Jamil [RS001E] 6) Sif [RS001F] 7) Hawke [RS001G] 8) Barbara [RS001H] Information to be added in future Update. ====================================== RS002 Job Class Description and Skills ====================================== This section contains the complete listing of all 38 Job Class in Romancing Saga, as well as their requirements. These are divided into Basic, Advanced, and Legendary classes. Job Skill Training, Jewel Cost, and Discount! --------------------------------------------- Raising your skill level not only allow your characters to learn more techniques (weapon skills), but also reduce the DP Consumption of both techniques and spells. As for map skills, raising those will increase the skill level of your proficiencies (more on that later). You can learn new skill/job from the job trainers. There is a skill trainer in every town. It will cost Jewels to learn skills, which you can get from completing quests, fighting monsters, and using map skills. Once you get a job to level 3, you can learn individual skill in addition to training an entire skillset. There are advantages and disadvantage to training an entire skillset: You get a discount from training it as a skill set than if you train the skills individually. But you will need more jewels to train the entire skillset. Here is DragoonKain33's explaination on skill set discount: "The discount to buying skill sets is 5% per skill (if it is not bought individually), rounded down? So a 6 skill advance class has a 30% discount if you buy all 6 at the same time. Classes of note to take advantage of this are Ascetic and Valhallan Warrior (Both of which has all their skills represented in the Cleric and Warrior class respectively) and Martial Artist (If you're aiming for master, spending 32 Jewels more by buying this class nets you 2 more lvl3 skills and a heck of a lot less DP consumption before you get legendary class status)." Good info indeed! Individual Cost of training a skill: Level 0->1 10 Jewels Level 1->2 25 Jewels Level 2->3 150 Jewels Level 3->4 750 Jewels* Level 4->5 1500 Jewels * I have summarized DragoonKain's clarification on Jewel Discount: Bascially, you get a 50% discount learning Lv4 skills from your starting job skill set. So if you start off as a swordsman, then you get 50% off for all the skills in the swordsman skillset when you train from Lv3->Lv4. The greatest benefit of this is when you choose an advanced/legendary job class in your new game+. You can train any skill/skill set to a maximum level of 5. SOme jobs will benefit from a higher job level, such as Hunter get a high accuracy bonus. (Almost all basic & advanced job benefit from a higher level). DragoonKain also point out Zach Keene's DP consumption chart: One level of reduction in DP consumption for these things (max 5 he says): -Having at least 1 level of said skill -Every class level beyond the first -Legendary Class -Having 20 weapon techs, no magic spells** -Having 10 magic spells, no weapon techs Reduction levels, btw go: 8->6->4->3->2->1(red)->1(Yellow)->0 (Weapons) 8->6->4->3->2->1a(red)->1b(red)->1(yellow)->0 (Magic and Martial Arts) **Zach Keene himself have this to add: It's possible for a character to have a few magic spells without negating the 20 weapon tech reduction. However the number seems to vary from character to character and I haven't figured out how it's determined (unless it's just preset for each character.) Thanks for the additional info. Job List & Description ====================== Basic Job Classes (14 Total) [RS002A] ------------------------------------- Basic job classes consists of a skill set of 3 skills. You only need to train all of the required skill to level 1 in order to gain access to the job class. Please see RS003A for the Basic Job Class Requirements. Ascetic - Increased Resistance to Physical Status Ailments. Blacksmith - Increased Resistance to Will Power Status Ailments. Craftsman - Chance to use no DP/LP for Techniques Entertainer - Prevent enemy from performing combo. Frontier Guard - Reduce chance of enemy ambush. Increase chance to guard. Geckling Knight - Increase chance of counter attack Herbalist - Can gather high quality herbs Pioneer - Recover quickly from Will Power Status Ailments Pirate - Attack Speed bonus, can attack faster. Ranger - Chance to use less BP for Techniques Swordsman - Deal Greater Damage in Attack Mode Thief - Increase range of Find Chest and Find Treasure Trader - Increased chance to trade with monster Valhallan Warrior - Recover quickly from Physical Status Ailments (All effects are increased by job levels) Advanced Job Classes (15 Total) [RS002B] ---------------------------------------- Advanced job classes consists of a skill set of 5 or 6 skills. You will need to train all of them to level 2 in order to gain access to the job class. Please see RS003B for the Advanced Job Class Requirements. Assassin* - Increased chance of Ambush Castle Knight - Increase chance of Deflecting Attacks Draconite - Increase attack power in attack mode, attack speed in trick mode. Can only deflect attacks in defence mode. Estamirian Rebel - Increase chance to inflict status ailments Hunter - Increase bow accuracy Imperial Knight - Increase chance to combo with previous attacker Imperial Marine - Increase chance to combo with next attacker Imperial Scholar** - Can combine 2 spells to make a more powerful spell Kjar Sentinel - Increase bow damage Martial Artist - Increase chance to perform surge, reverse, and surge-reverse Red Mage* - Increase power of Sorcery and Necromancy spells Rosalian Lancer - Increased attack speed in trick mode Rosalian Mage** - Can combine 3 spells to make a more powerful spell Rosalian Officer - Greatly increases defence in defence mode Wizard - Increase damage of all spells Note: * You cannot learn the Sorcery Skill required for Assassin and Red Mage until you can open up Auldburg at end game of first play-thru. ** You can use spell fusion with these 2 mage classes. Just go to the spell menu, press triangle and select the spells you want to combine. Certain combination open up new spells. Go to RS010 for list of fusion magic. Legendary Job Classes (9 Total) [RS002C] ---------------------------------------- Legendary job classes consists of a skill set of 7 skills. You must train all of them to level 3 in order to gain access to the job class. In addition, you can only change into these jobs in specific places. Such as Cleric in Crystal City. All of them reduce the DP/LP costs of Techniques and spells by 2. No futher description are given by the game. Bard Cleric Fortuneteller Master Rogue Shaman Sorcerer Templar Warrior Skill List ========== Weapon Skills [RS002D] ---------------------- Foil Short Sword Long Sword Great Sword Scimitar Hand Axe Club Tow-handed Sword Katana Two-handed Axe Staff Pole Arm Lance Bow Martial Arts Shield Magic Skills [RS002E] --------------------- Pyrology Hydrology Aerology Terrology Illusions Demonology Cosmology Sorcery Bewitchery Necromancy Map Skills [RS002F] ------------------- Search Gathering Strategy Survival Covert Trading Map Skills vs Proficiencies [RS002G] ------------------------------------ Map Skills are the skill set you can learn from the skill trainer, such as Search & Gather. Proficiencies are the actual ability under each map skill category. Go to RS004 for the complete list. ============================================================ RS003 Basic, Advance, And Legendary Classes Requirement List ============================================================ You can learn and change to Basic and Advanced job at the same skill trainer. However, you have to learn the skills for Legendary Classes and certain advanced classes in Ettinham, or as combination of other skills from all over the world. I have included the job change location in round brackets. RS003A Basic Job Class Requirement ----------------------------------- Ascetic [Basic] Staff, Martial Arts Terrology Blacksmith [Basic] Club, Pyrology, Gathering Craftsman [Basic] Short Sword, Cosmology, Strategy Entertainer [Basic] Long Sword, Martial Arts, Covert Frontier Guard [Basic] Foil, Long Sword, Shield Geckling Knight [Basic] Two-handed Axe, Lance, Martial Arts Herbalist [Basic] Terrology, Gathering, Survival Pioneer [Basic] Hand Axe, Club, Gathering Pirate [Basic] Foil, Hand Axe, Hydrology Ranger [Basic] Bow, Terrology, Search Swordsman [Basic] Foil, Long Sword, Two-handed Sword Thief [Basic] Foil, Search, Strategy Trader [Basic] Strategy, Survival, Trading Valhallan Warrior [Basic] Hand Axe, two-handed Sword, Survival RS003B Advanced Job Class Requirement -------------------------------------- Assassin [Advanced] (South Estamir) Short Sword, Illusions, Sorcery, Covert, Trading Castle Knight [Advanced] Long Sword, Great Sword, Two-handed Sword, Pole Arm, Shield Draconite [Advanced] Great Sword, two-handed Sword Katana, Pyrology, Illusions, Bewitchery Estamirian Rebel [Advanced] Scimitar, Katana, Martial Arts, Illusions, Search Hunter [Advanced] Scimitar, Hand Axe, Bow, Terrology, Search Imperial Knight [Advanced] Foil, Great Sword, Hand Axe, Shield, Cosmology Imperial Marine [Advanced] Short Sword, Scimitar, Hand Axe, Aerology, Survival Imperial Scholar [Advanced] Hydrology, Aerology, Illusions, Cosmology, Trading Kjar Sentinel [Advanced] Lance, Bow, Hydrology, Demonology, Covert Martial Artist [Advanced] Scimitar, Katana, Staff, Pole Arm, Martial Arts Red Mage [Advanced] (Weiserheim) Pyrology, Aerology, Demonology, Sorcery, Necromancy Rosalian Lancer [Advanced] Short Sword, Pole Arm, Bow, Bewitchery, Search Rosalian Mage [Advanced] Club, Staff, Hydrology, Demonology, Bewitchery Rosalian Officer [Advanced] Long Sword, Club, Lance, Shield, Bewitchery Wizard [Advanced] Staff, Pyrology, Aerology, Demonology, Cosmology RS003C Legendary Job Class Requirement & Location -------------------------------------------------- Unlike Basic and Advanced Classes, you cannot train and change to a Legendary job in the same location. Therefore you have to go around the world training all the required skills to lv3, then go to the location listed below to change to the Legendary job. Bard [Legendary] (Melvir) Foil, Long Sword, Bow, Demonology, Cosmology, Search, Trading Cleric [Legendary] (Crystal City) Club, Staff, Martial Arts, Hydrology, Terrology, Cosmology, Gathering Fortuneteller [Legendary] (Tarmitta) Club, Hydrology, Aerology, Illusions, Bewitchery, Search, Gathering Master [Legendary] (Jelton) Scimitar, Club, Katana, Pole Arm, Martial Arts, Bewitchery, Covert Rogue [Legendary] (South Estamir) Foil, Short Sword, Scimitar, Bow, Strategy, Covert, Trading Shaman [Legendary] (Yeoville) Long Sword, Scimitar, Hand Axe, Shield, Pyrology, Aerology, Demonology Sorcerer [Legendary] (Weiserheim) Staff, Pyrology, Hydrology, Aerology, Terrology, Illusions, Demonology Templar [Legendary] (North Estamir) Long Sword, Two-handed Sword, Lance, Cosmology, Bewitchery, Search, Survival Warrior [Legendary] (Mirsaburg) Great Sword, Hand Axe, Two-handed Sword, Two-handed Axe, Lance Shield, Survival After you are qualified to change for the job, simply go to the city indicated and you will be able to change to the desired legendary job class. ============================= RS004 Proficiencies and Usage ============================= RS004A Proficiencies List The same skill trainer that let you train jobs also let you train proficiencies Unlike skills, you have to pay gold to learn them. Your skill level with your map skills (search, gather, strategy, survival, covert and trade) directly impact the effectiveness of the proficiency. Example: Find Chest is a Proficiency Under the Search skill. If you did not level the Search skill, even if your learned Find Chest, your find chest ability is Lv0. If you train your search to lv2 (e.g. train a job with search to lv2), then your find chest ability is now level 2. After you learn the skill, you have to equip it before you can use it. And you can only equip it while in town. To equip your proficiencies, simply go to the menu and select proficiencies. Here is a list of proficiencies, and which map skill they belong to. Search ------ When you run around the world, you will come across places with a big red ! That means there is something there to be found. Just use L1/R1 to scroll to the appropriate skill and press O to activate it. Find Chest - Find treasure chest, best use with disarm trap and pick locks. Find Ore - Find ore, must use with Mine. Find Herbs - Find herbs, must use with Harvest. Find Treasure - Only work if you have a treasure map, must use with Excavate. Find Traps - This is for finding hidden areas Gather ------ Mine - Mine Ore Harvest - Harvest Herbs to make potions at apocathy Excavate - Excavate buried treasure Strategy -------- Pick Locks - Pick the lock on locked chests Disarm Traps - disarm traps on booby traped chests Vigilance - less likely for monsters to get first strike when they approach you from behind Survival -------- Climb - climb cliff Jump - jump across gaps Covert ------ Lurk - avoid enemy detection that relies on sight Move Silently - avoid enemy detection that relies on sound Ambush - increase chance of first strike against monsters Trade ----- Trade - trade item with monsters In order to use trade, you must equip your trade menu first. Go to item menu and press triangle. You can have up to 5 things there. Next time, go near the mobs and press O while Trade is the active skill. Note that only certain monsters will trade with you. The rest would still attack. Hints: Lurk and Move Silently is the most used skills, followed by find chests, disarm trap and pick lock. Climb and Jump are dungeon specific skills. Find ore and mine is for mining (which you will use a lot for Gray's quest). Find herb and harvest is for leveling your apocathy skill. You can better herbs when you gather as a herbalist. RS004A Proficiencies List RS004B How to Use Treasure Map, Find Treasure, and Excavate RS004C How to use Trade Q3: How do I use a treasure map? -------------------------------- Once you got a treasure map, go to the indicated location with both Find Treasure and Excavate map skill equipped (Remember, you can only equip them in town). You can check for the location of the treasure by going into the item menu and put your cursor on the treasure map. It also indicate the search skill level you need. Once you get to the area where the treasure is located, look for a blue pointer on your compass in addition to the original compass pointer. This is especially important in multiple areas dungeon such as Mt. Scurve. Check each mini-section until you see a blue arrow, and you will know the treasure is found in that section. Just move around and watch for the a pop up prompt that indicating a treasure chest is nearby. Now Switch to the Find Treasure map skill and press O to use the skill (You may need to turn help on for the find treasure message to appear). A gold circle would appear for a few seconds to show you where the treasure is. Now switch to the Excavate command, and use it near where the gold circle showed up. A chest will appear... Congratulations, you just found your treasure chest! You can do all of the above while in Lurk and Move Silently. Good training for your covert skill. In addition, the location and the content of the chest is randomly generated the moment you enter the location. So, if you save before you found the treasure, and got something you didn't want... you can simply reload, exit and then re-enter the area and see if you would get something better. Or for a more efficient way, make a save in the city before you enter the dungeon, and simply soft-reset and try again from that save file. Many rare and powerful items are found from the chests, including the Legendary Shooting Star katana. Here is small sample of armor that I've found from lv1 treasure chests. Format: Name Phy Def Mag Def Weight Notes Body: Shimmering Sand Robe 13 13 6 Int +5, Wil +5, Ailments +10, Immune to Darkness Leg: Heeled Shoes Footwear 3 3 1 Agi +1, Cha +1 Necklace: Amber Maleate 1 1 0 Cha +7; Fire +10, Cold +10, Electricity +10, Energy +10 Bone Amulet 1 1 0 Com -5, Cha -5, Immune to Life Attack Last Leaf 1 1 0 Com +7, Immune to Life Attack Ring: Albatross Ring 1 1 0 Int +1, Wil +1, Com +1, Cha +1, Immune to poison Bejeweled Ring 1 1 0 Int +3, Fire +10, Cold +10, Electricity +10, Energy +10 Evil Eye Talisman 1 1 0 Int -5, Wil -5, Immune to Gazes Gold Ring 1 1 0 Com +1, Ailments +10 Pearl Ring 1 1 0 Com +1, Electricity +10 Pocket Dragon 1 1 0 Str +3, Vit +3, Fire +20, Ice +20, Electricity +20 Silver Ring 1 1 0 Com +1, Energy +10 Q4: How do I use the Trade Proficiency? --------------------------------------- It is recommended that you have someone with the Job Trader in the party before you try it. Trader increases chance of monster trading, and you might get better stuff than without a trader in the group. After you change someone's job to Trader, and equipped the trade proficiency from him/her. Go to your item menu, press triangle to open the trade menu. Equip it with items (weapon and armor would work). Please note, the computer will choose the most expensive item on the list by default. Don't put stuff you can't afford to lose :p Now, go to an area with monsters. Use lurk and move silently, move around till you see a monster where its icon is greenish, and use trade. It is a good idea to quick save before hand. A menu will pop up with a list of 5 items. Select the item you want, and the computer will automatically select the most expensive item. If the items in your trade menu is not of equivalent or higher value than what the monster has it will be grey out and you cannot trade it (it will fail if you trade it). Please note, you can't cancel after you start the trade, that's why you want to quick save beforehand. After the trade, the monster will disappear. There is usually 1 or 2 monsters per area that can trade. You can get stuff like Animal Coin, herbs, stone axe, tempering materials (including rare ones). ==================================== RS005 Event Ranks and Events (Quest) ==================================== Understanding Event Ranks [RS005A] ----------------------------------- Now that you have an idea of the characters and the job system, it is time to move on to the walkthru. But first, I must introduce you to the Event Rank system (ER). The event rank is an indication of time progression in the world of Mardias. As time progress, certain events become available while other events come to an end (wether you finish it or not). Combat is the major factor in pushing time (ER) forward. Tough enemies will increase the time further, while weak enemies (those fights that doesn't give your characters any stats up at the end) have little impact. As such, Quest that involves boss fight will also increase your ER. The system is purposely introduced to make it difficult, but not impossible, to do most of the events in one play thru. The game creator wants you to experience the world of Mardias from all 8 characters, with each one opening up something unique and different. It also discourages players to level grind - as oppose to RPGs like the Dragon Quest series. Rather, the SaGa experience is all about constantly being on an adventure, and constantly being challenged. The tech sparking system is designed to rewards player who are willing to tough things out. The more difficult the enemy you fight, the more likely it will trigger, which would enable your character to use a new and powerful technique at no BP/DP cost! In addition, the rewards from the various quests will most likely outweights anything you get from level grinding. It is impossible to do every quests in one playthru*, but there is nothing that stop you from trying to get as many as you can. A normal game where you just take things as they come will clock in at about 30-40 hours. A do everything game will take you 60+ hours. On my Aisha playthru, she has clocked in 90 hrs and counting (but I did spend a lot of time to gather info and test various stuff suchs as spell fusion, sub-characters, tempering, harvesting, and mining. *some quests require multiple play-thru while others are character specific. One last thing, Kouli has published his way of using battle count to help gauge your event rank long before the Brady Game Guide. It is good stuff and definitely worth taking a look. New Game+ [RS005B] ------------------ As previously mentioned, the game creator didn't want you to do everything in one go. Rather, he wants you to play the game from multiple characters and unlock different things each time. A New Game+ feature is available and will carry over some progress from your previous playthrus. After you beat the game, watch all of the end game sequence (which is impacted by your actions thru out the game) and credit, and you will be prompted to save a game clear file. Loading this file will enable you to start the new game+, which carries over the following progress: 1) Jobs you've unlocked If you have changed into a job that you qualify for, then it is flagged as unlocked, and you can select that job on start up. Please note that you will be level 1 of that job, regardless of basic, advanced, or legendary. Please note that you will get a 50% discount from Lv3->4 of your starting job (DragoonKain), please see the skill section RS002 for full details. 2) Shop & Apocathy level (clout) This is very nice bonus, as you can now access good equipment sooner. This is also very important for Gray, as he needs access to the various tempering materials sold in the shops to temper his falcata. Marcasite requires a clot level of 15. 3) 2 "Bonus" quests 2 special quests requires multiple playthru to unlock: The Unlucky Woman - unlocks a hidden boss and Who am I? - unlocks 1 or 2 hidden characters, either Darque or Aldora The spells and techniques you've learned, items (weapon, armor, tempering materials), money, jewels, stats, and job levels will *NOT* carry over, and for good reason. For example, if you carry over the techs, you won't be able to spark them again, especially in a tough fight. How to Tell Your Event Rank [RS005C] ------------------------------------ By talking to the little kids from the voluntary brigade and see what questions he will answer, you can tell which Event rank you are in. This is extracted directly from the Brady Guide. Rank Question [In main menu] 1 What are proficiencies? 2 I want more money. 3 How do I get more jewels? 4 School me in techniques and spells. 5 There's a chest I can't reach. 6 I want to learn even more advanced things. [Under Advance questions] 7 Stuns, shocks and Snares. 8 Vendors 9 Herbs and Ores 10 Classes 11 Weapons and Shields 12 Modes 13 Blacksmithing II 14 Concoctions II 15 Synthesizing Spells 16 Ambush 17 Lurking and Moving Silently 18 Trading 19 Blacksmithing III 20 Final Secrets N.B. For questions 7 onwards, you have to check under advance questions. You will know if there is something new there by looking for "New" in front of the questions. Quest List & their ER Limit [RS005D] ------------------------------------ Here is a list of quests base on the Brady Guide as well. I follow their list because it is shorter (excluded all of the minstrel's stores, and information notes such as ecology, temple tour, etc. Time sensitive quests are in (). This include non-time sensitive quests that have an impact on time sensitive ones. So plan ahead and do them as soon as possible. N.B. Quest 51 is moved to early game section because it is very time dependant. Legend: # The Quest # assigned, and I will refer to them by Quest #. Quest Name of the Quest Event Rank The range of Event rank you can do it in, example: 0+ means it does not have a time constraint 6+ means it opens up after ER6 and have no time constraint 0-2 means it opens up at ER 0, and you want to pass the critical points of the quest by ER2. To be on the safe side, complete it by ER2. Notes Information that I've added # Quest Event Rank Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- [Early Game quests, mostly time sensitive] 1 Monsters to the East 0+ Albert Only 2 Assault on Isthmus Keep 0+ Albert Only 3 Valhalland Monsters 0+ Sif Must be in Party 4 An Expeditionary Force 0+ Albert & Sif Only 5 Amethyst of Visions 0+ 6 Plain Treasure 0+ 7 Voice of the Blade 0+ (8) Unsettling Settlements 0-2 (9) Innkeeper's Daughter 0-4 Do this with quest 10 (10) A suspicious Demise 0-4 Do this with quest 9 (11) Wuhan's Secret 0-5 (12) Raid on the Depository 3-5 (13) Pride of the Knights 3-7 (14) The Fiends of Saoki 4+ Try to do this by ER16 15 Free the Gecklings 0+ Required for Quest 22 16 Stolen Nymphs 6+ 17 A Bodyguard for Louie 6+ (18) Neville's Request 6+ Try to do this by ER9 19 Creepy Butterfly 7+ 20 Eule Gives a Hoot 8+ With Claudia in party (21) Ancient Texts 0+ Required for Quest 22 (22) Ailing Emperor 9-13 23 Constance Kidnapped 9-17 (24) Isle of Evil 9-18 25 Oh, Mummy 0+ *51* An Unlucky Woman 2-12/2+ Quest 51 cannot be completed on 1st play thru, and carry over to the next game. [Middle Game quests, somewhat time sensitive] # Quest Event Rank Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 26 Faerie's Grove 0+ 27 Water Dragon Rite 10+ 28 The Raincloud Armlet 10+ 29 The Cyclone Shoes 0+ 30 Test of Courage 0+ 31 The Ignigarde 0+ 32 Monsters of Mt. Tomae 10+ 33 The Ice Sword 0+ 34 Aquatic Ecology 10+ 35 Insect Ecology 10+ 36 Beast Ecology 10+ 37 Plant Ecology 10+ 38 Missing Taralians 7+ (39) Return of the Vampires 10+ 40 The Soulgutter 10+ 41 Silver's Treasure 0+ 42 Find the Aquamarine 11-15 43 The Assassins' Guild 12+ 44 The Mine Assaulted 14+ 45 Pirate Invasion 14+ 46 The Jewel Beast 10+ [End Game Quests, not time sensitive] # Quest Event Rank Notes ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 47 The Underwater Temple 17+ 48 Theodore's Madness 18+ 49 The Dragon Knight 18+ 50 Who Am I? 0+ 52 Frosthold Fortress 0+ Must complete 53 first 53 Frozen Lake Faerie 22 54 Auldburg 20+ 55 Trials of Elore 20+ 56 The Netherworld 20+ 57 Face Saruin 20+ ========================== RS006 Related Quest Chains ========================== In this section I will link all the related quests together to give you an idea of the plot, and what quests you need to do to complete the series. Please note that this *does not* include all the quests listed above!!! The name of the event chain is made up by me to highlight the theme of the plot. This section is meant to give you an idea of what to expect, so you can take notes and look for specific quests that you want to go after. When you are ready to start the game, please proceed to RS007 (Character Intro Walkthru). Event Chain List: ================= RS006A Terror of the Frontier - The Jewel Beast RS006B Unlocking Darque/Aldora & Schirach RS006C Disaster at Melvir, Isle of Evil + Pirate Coast RS006D Of Gecklings, Silver and Moonstone RS006E Treachery in the Dominion RS006F Wanted: Delivery Boy Or Gal (+ Wuhan's brothel) RS006G Ecology 101 RS006H Trouble from the Deep RS006I End Game? RS006J Frozen Secrets RS006K Fatestone Collection RS006A Terror of the Frontier - The Jewel Beast ----------------------------------------------- The Jewel Beast is Romancing SaGa's equivalent of Final Fantasy's Ultima Weapon. At event rank 16, it will set about the destruction of the Frontier. This can happen sooner or later depends on how many stationary monsters you have clear from the frontier by ER14 Updated Information from Red Star: If you defeat less then 11 fixed enemies in the frontier region, JB will wake up at ER 14 and leave the lair at ER 15. For every fixed enemy defeated above 10, you'll delay the awakening of JB by 1 ER to a maximum of awakening by ER 19. To get started, You can head to the frontier by recruiting Barbara. By doing various quests in the frontier to reduce the monsters, you can delay his awakening (Provided no one mention Jewel Beast): 8) Unsettling Settlements 14) The Fiends of Saoki 39) Return of the Vampires Finally, you will need to unlock the Jewel Beast's Lair 34) Aquatic Ecology (After you finish this quest, if you go back and talk to Strom, he will reveal the location of Jewel Beast's Lair. Since you heard of the Jewel Beast, it will awaken automatically at ER16. So don't talk to Strom unless you are ready to fight it) List of fixed enemies in the frontier region: - Yassi Cavern: Slimes at B1 and boss at B2 - Saoki Cavern: War Beasts at B1, Greater Zombies at B2 and Boss at B3 - Vampire's Den: Vampire minions at B1-B3, Werewolf at B4 and Boss at B4 - Jewel Beast's Lair: all 4 Pillars on the 1st floor and the Cockatrice at pile of pillars (minor edits) However, doing quest 43 early may cause Saruin's Minion to wake him up: 43) The Assassins' Guild (Defeating the final boss will cause Saruin's minion to wake him up, and this can happen before event 16). To navigate this place, just follow the direction of the lights near the center of the room. The # of lights indicate the # of rooms you have to go in that direction. See below for more info. >>> Assassins' Guild Navigation for Dummies (from Red Star) <<< There are 3 rooms that you can go to in the Assassins' Guild: - Go N N N E N E N S W N N to reach the boss room - Go N N N E N E N N to reach the ceremonial chamber (people who can't find the boss in the Assassins' Guild probably took a wrong step and ended up here) - Go N N N E N E N S E to reach a room with treasure boxes. RS006B Unlocking Darque/Aldora (Secrect Char) & Schirach (Hidden Boss) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- If you did the following correctly, you will be able to unlock Darque (secret character) and Schirach (Hidden Boss) on your 2nd+ play thru. Unlocking Aldora's full form will take 2 play thrus. Since unlocking Schirach comes first: Starting at Event Rank 2, you will need to get started on 51) An Unlucky Woman Basically, you need to talk to a woman in the pub at every other event rank starting at E.R. 2, until E.R. 12. She will appear in the following pubs. Once she appear there, she will not show up in the same pub again. So it is a good idea to make a check list of these pubs and checked off which one she appeared in. a) Altours b) Aurefount c) Jelton d) Mirsaburg e) North Estamir f) North Point g) Oapu h) South Estamir i) Tarmitta j) Weiserheim k) Weston l) Yeoville She will appear in a new pub 2 ER after your last encounter. Since there are 12 pubs, you can catch her a max of 6 times between ER2-12 each play thru. So it is possible to unlock Schirach on your second play thru if you are very careful about your ER. On the 12th time you meet her, you get to fight Scorn, a minion of Saruin. So be prepared (make sure you have a space in your inventory, as you will get the Fatestone, Diamond). If you wish to challenge Schirach, find her temple in the Estamir Tunnel at ER19+. Unlocking Darque or Aldora -------------------------- Here are the condition for unlocking Darque: 1) Comple Quest 43, The Assassins' Guild 2) Defeat the Minion that try to steal your medalions outside Twinmoon Temple or Hiding in the Saruin Temple in Melvir Sewers after Quest 45, Pirate Invasion (Note, you need to fight the Saruin Priest in the temple before you go rescue the emperor). 3) Talked to Death in the Netherworld Once you've met the conditions above in the first play thru, you will get a cutscene where Death will release a soul from the Purgotary as soon as you start a new game. Once you invite Darque, you will start quest 50, Who am I? As you play Darque and his Dex/Int increase, you will unlock some of his memories. Dex will unlock Darque's memories while Int will unlock Aldroa. The magic # are 16, 22, 30, 40, and 50. 16-40 would raise their corresponding job levels (Assassin for Darque and Wizard for Aldora) as you do not have access to Sorcery magic until you get to Ettinham at ER20. Darque: At Dex 50, he will leave your party. At this point, go to the Assassin's guild with an empty slot and an empty inventory spot in your party. Go thru the maze and talk to Darque and help him fight Saruin to have him rejoin you. Your reward's is Darque's Sword. Aldora: To fully unlock Aldora, you will need to meet Death in the Netherworld (with Darque in your party once she you've seen the cutscene when she hits 50 int) and then beat the 1000 level dungeon, Purgatory. Don't worry, you are not going down 1 level at a time like a certain set of stairs... *kick Cloud's butt while he is in drags* You will get a Cut Scene at the 1000th floor. After that, pick up the ring and head back to town. Look for Aldora and give her the ring. After you defeat Saruin with Aldora (trapped in Darque), the next play thru she will appear as Aldora. Please note, if Darque hits 50 dex at any time except in purgotory, you will have failed in unlocking Aldora, as he would run back to the Assassin's Guild as you enter a town. So, you might be able to pull it off if you head straight for Death, but have not been tested. RS006C Disaster at Melvir, Isle of Evil + Pirate Coast ------------------------------------------------------ Here is the list of quests related to this quest chain. Take note as this is the most time sensitive quest chain in the game. 9) Innkeeper's Daughter 10) A suspicious Demise 12) Raid on the Depository 18) Neville's Request 22) Ailing Emperor 24) Isle of Evil 44) The Mine Assaulted 45) Pirate Invasion The first 5 quests above forebolds what is about to befall Melvir, and it is up to you to save this city. Quest 22 also require you take on the Geckling quest chain. QUest 24 is not related to this series, but the time frame to do it is. So I have included it for your benefit. Completing this quest chain correctly will enable you to fight a minion of Saruin that satisfy the condition to unlock Darque/Aldora. Notes on this series: a) You need to do quest 9 and 10 together. b) Speak to the police in Melvir to start this quest c) For quest 12, you need to go to Meliver Sewers to finish the quest. You can recruit Patrick as a result. d) Optional: Make a spot in your PT before attempting 18 to recruit Gian during the mission. You can also get Gian later in the Palace. e) Quest 22 requires you to get the Moonstone, which involves the Geckling quest chain (see below). f) You can only do Quest 24 after Quest 22 and before 45, You only get 1 go at this. If you left the island before you got the fatestone, you failed. g) Regarding Quest 45, the priate invasion. Although the priates don't invade until ER16, you can prepare the city for the invasion at event rank 14. Simply go to Melvir Sewers and look for the pirate hideout. Crack it open and fight pirates. Then warn the Melvir police about it, and make sure you rest at the inn. If you see a baracade outside the entrance to the port, you've done in correctly. h) There are 15 miners trapped in the Aurefont Mine for quest 44. Rescue them all for a lovely $30k reward. You can still look for them after you defeat the 10 monsters, but make sure you don't leave the mine until you find them. There is no roaming monsters either, so bring find ore and mine instead of Lurk and Move Silently. i) Pirate Coast Access: If you did part g above... When the pirates invade, leave them alone and go straight to Butcher. Afterwards, they would beg for mercy, and one of them would get away from the police and hide in the pirate hideout back in the sewers. You can demand this pirate to take you to the pirate coast after you save the emperor. j) After you defeat the Butcher and before you go defend the emperor, head to the sewers again to under Elore's temple. You will fight a priest of Saruin and 2 of his underlings. Doing so will force a minion of Saruin to appear after you save the emperor. Come back here to fight the Minion will satisfy the condition to unlock Darque/Aldora. RS006D Of Gecklings, Silver and Moonstone ----------------------------------------- This series of quests is needed for #22, the Ailing Emperor Quests involved includes: 15) Free the Gecklings 21) Ancient Texts And as a bonus, you get access to: 41) Silver's Treasure Notes on this series: a) You will need the find Traps Map Proficiency for Geckling cave and Silver's Cave. b) You will need Guella Ha in your party to get silver's map for #15: After you got the quest in Oapu, go talk to the Geckling elder with Guella Ha in your party before you fight the merchant. c) After you completed #15, a Geckling will offer to sell you an ancient scroll for $10k. If Hawke is not in your Party, he will buy the map before you. Go to Uso to recruite Hawke and get the scroll for free, or buy it off him for 15k. (You can invite Hawke to get the scroll, then boot him) d) You have to read every line on ancient languages in the Melvir library to unlock the clues in the ancient scroll. Then visit the temple indicated for first of 2 key. You cannot get the 2nd key until you can start the Ailing Emperor quest (22). e) In order to recruit Silver, you have to do quest 45 as indicated above in "iii) Disaster at Melvir, Isle of Evil + Pirate Coast" so the pirate will take you to Pirate Coast. f) Cave A in the Inner Jungle leads to Twinmoon Temple g) Cave B & C links to Silver's Cave and various dead ends. RS006E Treachery in the Dominion -------------------------------- Quests involved in this series: 13) Pride of the Knights 23) Constance Kidnapped 48) Theodore's Madness 49) The Dragon Knight If you met Neidhart, you will need to complete the following as well: 42) Find the Aquamarine Notes regarding this series: a) Optional: Make 2 spots in your party if you want to recruit Rapheal and Theodore into your party. b) In the abandon keep, walking on cracked areas with cause it to break which allow you to fall to the level below. Your objective is to fall to the basement and then find the boss. c) Before you rescue Constance, make sure you buy as much fire magic from Flammer. Otherwise you can't get the 2 high level fire magic until you complete 48. d) In the kidnapper's cave, move the status around to open the gates. e) If you met Neidhart previously, and want to recruit the Dragon Knight, be sure to bring him with you when you escort Rapheal to Drachevale. Otherwise you will be forced to control Neidhart to kill the Dragon Knight (lose = game over). f) To recruit the dragon knight, return to Drachenvale after you completed #49, with a space in your party. g) Dragon Knight cannot equip your weapon and only have 5 life points. You can only equip necklace and ring on him. His armor is 32/32 with +40 resistance on fire/cold/lightning. To make Dragon Knight more effective, you will need a Pocket Dragon (Ring) and a Last Leaf (Necklace). Pocket Dragon will boost his elemental defence to 60 (Star status, aka immunity). Last leaf will protect him from direct LP attacks from bosses. RS006F Wanted: Delivery Boy Or Gal + Wuhan's Brothel ---------------------------------------------------- Quests Involved in this series: 11) Wuhan's Secret 27) Water Dragon Rite 28) The Raincloud Armlet 29) The Cyclone Shoes 30) Test of Courage 31) The Ignigarde 32) Monsters of Mt. Tomae 33) The Ice Sword 38) Missing Taralians You might also start picking up items for the Faerie's Grove (26). Notes regarding this series: a) Make sure you talk to the agent in the S. Estamir pub before you do quest #11 and #27, so you can get an extra reward. b) Getting Kidnapped: If you are playing as Aisha, you can recruit Hawke to travel to Oapu, (you can do the Free the Geckling quest while there if you want) then travel to Melvir and invite Gray. This will unlock South Estamir so you can talk to the Agent. Now disband everyone from the party, go back to the Steppes and let yourself get killed by a kidnapper. You will meet Farah, and Jamil will come to your rescue. After the dust settles, you can collect 2 rewards: Jewels from Farah and gold from the agent. c) Make sure you spare Wuhan in #11 if you want to collect reward (Wistera Bow) from Wuhan in Quest #27. d) Quest #27 set off a series of annyoing go fetch quests... e) There are 3 ways to do quest #33. If you are rich, buy the sword early. If not, you can either kill Galahad for it (increase your relation to Evil, +200 if Galahad was in your party previously, +100 otherwise), Or you can make a room in your party after you talk to Pyrix in #31. Galahad will join you and hand over the ice sword. You can immediately boot him. f) You can do quest #31 and #32 together, so you do not have to make 2 trips to see Pyrix. g) Start the quest Missing Taralians (38) before you talk to Avi on Mt. Scurve will give an extra cut scene. h) Quest #30: Talk to the two guys in the Crydstal City Pub will allow you to pick up Avi's feather (headgear). i) You can do quest 29, 30, and 38 on one trip. j) It is a good idea to wait for quest 27 to start before you do the other quests in this series. Will save you a lot of tiem and effort. RS006G Ecology 101 ------------------- If you think the elemental kinds are annoying for making you go fetch, think again. Now you are on pest control duties. Quests Involved in this series: 34) Aquatic Ecology 35) Insect Ecology 36) Beast Ecology 37) Plant Ecology The water spirit for Faerie's Grove (26) can only be acquire when doing quest #34. If you miss it, you are SoL. Notes regarding this series: a) After you finish Aquatic Ecology (34) and talk to Strom, he will reveal the location of Jewel Beast's Lair b) Make sure you get the water spirit in Water Dragon Temple before you set the 4 crystals in place. Otherwise you will never get back in. c) You can talk to the elemental king again to check the rankings. Once you talk to them, they will automatically send you to the beginning of the dungeon. d) Check your Notes, there is some very helpful information there to help you do the ecology. Example, since plants relies on beast to prosper, kill everything but beasts and plants until they are the top 2 on the list, then kill a beast or 2 and plants will be #1. e) If you can't find Aquatic on Mt. Scurve, go to any caves in Crystal Lake. f) Killing things in the same map region as that of the elemental king will satisfy them. e.g. (Mt. Tomae, Plains, or anywhere on Ligau Isle) would please Pyrix. RS006H Trouble from the Deep ------=--------------------- Mermaids and trouble goes hand in hand... Quests Involved in this series: 16) Stolen Nymphs 17) A Bodyguard for Louie 47) The Underwater Temple Notes Regarding this series: a) 16 and 17 are related and need to be done together. b) Completing 16 & 17 will automatically unlock 47. Make sure you are ready before accepting to help Marina. Otherwise you won't be able to get out until you got the Fatestone. You need to fight a Turtle Dragon and then a Minion. RS006I End Game? ---------------- There are 3 end game scenarios depending on your affinity with good, evil, or middle of the raod. 54) Auldburg (Middle of the road) 55) Trials of Elore (Good) 56) The Netherworld (Evil) Speak to the Minstrel when you hit even rank 20 and he will tell you he is worried about Saruin destoying the world. Tell him it won't happen, and he will unlock one of the 3 quests for you. Notes regarding this series: a) It is possible to unlock all 3 quests, as long as you do not unlock quest 57. (You will unlock 57 by completing any of the 3 quests). b) After you unlock Quest 54, talk to the little kid in Uso to unlock the Auldburg location on your map. You can try then try to unlock 55 & 56. c) Buying Cosmology spells from the Melvir Temple is the easiest way to raise your Alignment to Elore. Vortex such as Phantom and The Wheel will also work. d) If you chose to kill other people (Wuhan, Galahad, Pyrix) in your play thru, you would likely have a good relationship with Death. However, it is not a requirement. You can simply do 50 Pillar VOrtex (e.g. 3 people, position Front-Middle-Front, Artful Slash -> Round Kick -> Artful Slash). e) Equip Jump before you go into the Netherworld. f) The gaint you fight in Auldburg may drop the mullock needed for Gray's sword. So make a clean save before you fight them, and see if you got the one you need (They drop other mullocks as well). g) Choose your final party before attempting the Trial of Elore. The Minstrel will no longer be available. RS006J Frozen Secrets --------------------- Quests Involved in this series: 52) Frosthold Fortress 53) Frozen Lake Faerie Notes regarding this series: a) This quest can be start on/after you begin the end game scenario. You will need to complete Quest 53 before you can do 52. b) Having met death and revive a character is the easiest way to get this scenario trigger. Otherwise raise your event rank to 22. That will require you to fight a lot of tough monsters to bring the ER that high. c) Spoiler: You get to unlock another hidden character, Frielei, and the Obsidian Sword Fatestone for quest 52. RS006K Fatestone Collection --------------------------- In your 2nd+ play thru, you have the opportunity to collect all 10 fatestones. If you set all 10 upon Saruin's altar, you will increase Saruin to his most powerful form... with 90,000HP. This is for those of you that are up for a good challenge. You can only collect all 10 fates on your 2nd+ playthru, provided you did quest 51 perfectly. Here is their location and the quest you can get them from: Ruby (Fatestone of Fire) - Kept by Flammar in Weiserheim (Quest 48) Aquamarine (Fatestone of Water) - Crystal Lake's Cave E (enter thru Cave D, Q42) Topaz (Fatestone of Earth) - Nisa's Underground Temple under Kaklim Desert (Q38) Opal (Fatestone of Wind) - Silver's Treasure Cave on Walon Isle (Quest 41) Amethyst (Fatestone of Illusion) - Get it from Barbara (from Minstrel) (Quest 5) Emerald (Fatestone of Demon) - Isle of Evil (Quest 24) Moonstone (Fatestone of Energy {Bewitchery}) - Twinmoon Temple (Quest 22) Obsidian Sword - Frosthold Fortress (Quest 52) Black Diamond (Fatestone of Shadow {Sorcery}) - Underwater Temple (Quest 47) Diamond (Fatestone of Light) - Carried around by Schiele (Quest 51) ============================== RS007 Character Intro Walkthru ============================== Walkthru Checklist: RS007A Albert RS007B Aisha RS007C Gray RS007D Claudia RS007E Jamil RS007F Sif RS007G Hawke RS007H Barbara RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias RS007A Albert -------------- To be Added RS007B Aisha ------------- Aisha starts off as a young nomad girl from the Taralian tribe. If this is your first character playing Romancing SaGa, it can be rather overwhelming. In addition, she starts out very poor (50G)... However, I have found an elaborate way to open up Aisha and make her rich! Basically we are trying to get to South Estamir to start the Wuhan's secrets before being kidnapped, so we can collect an extra 2500 gold in reward instead of the just 100ish jewels after the quest. After the introduction, you will be left with your horse on the Steppes of Galessa. Your first objective is to get rescued by Prince Neidhart, the dark knight (Move over Prince Charming). Here are the steps: 1) Run into an enemy on the plain and get killed. Choose to go to Crystal City to see the extra cutscene. This will follow by another set of cutsenes... 2) After the cutscene, your grandpa will tell you to visit Uso. So get going. Once there, recruit Hawke, which will open up North Point and Godongo on the world map (If Barbara is there, you can recruit her as well, but most likely her spot is filled by a mercenary). Feel free to talk to the locals to learn more about the world. Next, head to North Point. You can do this by pressing triangle to access the world map, then select North Point. 3) Visit the North Point Pub to recruit Guella Ha. You will need him for a quest coming up. Now, go to the world map again and select Godongo island. You may come across Diana and you definitely need her in your party. When you are done talking to the locals, head out side to the Jungle and go right. You will enter another town called Oapu. Visit the pub and talk to the two man standing together. You will learn that something strange is going on around town (this allows you to get started on the Free the Gecklings quest, and it is a good idea to do this quest since Aisha is needs the money to pay for a boat ride off the island). 4) Start the quest by going to the back of the weapon shop to hear the crying. Now head out to the Jungle and head for the Geckling Cave. You can move the stone to the light to open the door. Make your way to see the Geckling Elder (you don't need to fight at all, which is a good idea as you don't want to raise your event rank yet). The correct light spot: left for 1st door, lower left for 2nd door. Proceed to B2 and you will eventually get to the Geckling Village. 5) Talk to the Elder. Since Guella Ha is in the party, this will trigger an important cutscene that will let you collect Silver's Treasure map later. 6) Head out the way you came back to Oapu, and talk to the weapon shop owner for a boss fight. With Hawke, Guella Ha, and Diana helping you, you will have no problem at all. If you are lucky, you might have Barbara or the Minstrel helping you out as well. 7) After the Geckling march, go back to see the Geckling elder for your rewards. Then head back to Oapu and take a boat ride to Melvir. 8) At this point, you will need 2 spots in the party to make room for Gray and Claudia. They can be found in the pub in the 2nd floor. If the Minstrel is in your party, he will leave as soon as you enter the pub. So its a good idea to strip his equipment before you enter the pub (also strip whoever you are going to disband). Talk to the minstrel inside the pub to disband your 4th character. Inviting Claudia will open up Mazewood, while inviting Gray will open up a lot of new areas. The area that you are interested in is North Estamir. Please note, it is possible that Gray and Claudia might be in the pub of another city. If that is the case, talk to the people in town to open up the areas nearby. Visit those towns to pick up other people so you can open up more areas. As long as you can get to North Estamir, you are good. 9) Once there, look for a small raft by the docks and head over to South Estamir. Now head to the pub, talk to the bartender and ask for a job. She will direct you to the Agent that gives you the Wuhan's Secret quest. Watch out! There are beggar kids and thiefs that will be after your money. You don't need to give them anything. Do try to avoid the thiefs as you don't want to get into a fight yet. 10) Congratulation, now you are entitled to an extra 2500 Gold. Now, strip everyone's equipment, disband ALL of your party members, and use the World Map to head back to Steppes of Galessa. Near each of the the entrance is a stationary NPC (looks like the thief in S. Estamir). Talk to any of them to engage in a fight with a kidnapper (quicksave beforehand). You would want to throw the fight and lose to them (it is possible to kill the kidnapper, but that won't start the next step). 11) After you lost, you will be sold as a slave and is taken to Wuhan's secret room (quest complete $_$). Now equip yourself and then talk to everyone in the room (well you only need to talk to Farah...). This will trigger a cute cut scene... (not spoiling it) and then you get to fight Wuhan's guards. Since you are now armed to the teeth, go ahead and have Jamil defend, and let Aisha attack. There is a good chance Aisha would spark a new technique or two. Afterwards, you can either spare Wuhan for a later quest (which gives you a nice Wisteria bow), or kill him to increase your favor with the dark side. 12) When the dust settles, collect the reward from Farah (100ish jewels), recruit Jamil (or just recruit him to strip his equipment, he got a nice Rapier), and head over to the pub to collect your 2500 Gold. 13) Recruit Gray again to Unlock Uso and Crystal City. Please go to section RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias for the rest of the walkthru. RS007C Gray ------------ Gray's story is about tempering the Falcata into the Legendary Demonbrand, and is not recommended as your first character into playing Romancing SaGa. On your subsequent play thrus, when your Clout with the various shops is higher, you will be able to get the materials needed a lot easier. Gray start in Jelton with Galahad and Myriam in his party. You can choose to go to the plains right away and explore (Note, there is a bug where some players missed the boat ride and is stuck on the island forever). Alternatively, you can take the boat ride back to Melvir (the safe route): Here is the walkthru for the safe route so you don't miss the boat: 1) Talk to everyone in town to get Quest 6, Plain Treasure, and Minstrel's story 2) Exit to the plain (press triangle) and get into 1 battle. 3) Go back to Jelton, striped Galahad and Myriam's equipment, and then take a boat ride back to Melvir (they are going to leave your party). I suggest you quicksave before you get on the ship. 4) You can choose to go with either Myriam, Galahad, or ditch them both. Each one gives a different cut scene but has no impact on the story. If you quick saved, you can see all 3 choices. Choosing Myriam is most amusing. But I prefer to ditch them both so I can invite other people later on. You can always get them back later if you need them. 5) Exit the port and walk around 1F of Melvir. You will be stalked by Gian! Be a pal and speak to him, and he will pay you 1000 gold to protect Claudia. 6) Hang around Melvir to visit the library and pick up some quests. It is also a good idea to do them once you assemble the party of your choice, while your event rank is still low. 7) When you are ready, head back to Jelton to pick up your Falcata. (Please see the tempering section to learn how to temper (Search for RS008). The Falcata tempering guide is also there (Search for RS008C). There is no time limit on this quest, so you can do Yassi Cavern and then pick up your sword. This will guarentee you don't mess up your event rank. 8) While on the plains, you can also get the Dinosaur Egg for a good chunk of cash. Squeenix Man from the GameFAQ board has this trick to share: In the dinosaur nest, if your party is still way too weak to beat a dinosaur, do this BEFORE you grab the eggs, purposely pick a fight with each of the 5 dinosaurs. Choose retreat each time, using a different character's retreat option per dinosaur so nobody loses too much LP. The dinosaurs will now be cleared out of the cave, and then you can just grab the eggs and waltz safely back to Jelton. The one dinosaur outside this cave will be too far to even notice if you just keep on cruising. Enjoy spending that handy 7,000 gold. If you can't beat them, outwit them! And retreat won't harm or increase your Event Rank. Two bonus for the price of one. Please go to section RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias for the rest of the walkthru. RS007D Claudia --------------- Claudia's intro sequence is very easy and straight forward. As soon as you gain control of Claudia, go to menu, Position, and move Claudia to the middle row (press down once on Claudia). This will protect her as well as making her bow attack stronger. Now go inside Eule's house (in the tree to raid the chest). Head out, and move towards the screen until you get a cutscene. After a few maps, you will get into a fight. On the first round you will control only Gian. You can have him attack or defence, as it makes no real difference. On the next round Claudia and her 2 guardian animals will join the fight (Feel free to use the two animals best attack). After that you will get a map from Gian. Now head back the way you came to report back to Eule. Eule will encourage you to go see the world outside the forest. Rest in the house to recover your LP, and now you can head out to the world. You can go to Aurefont (nothing much to do here except to get a mercenary and the town's map) or directly to Melvir. At Melvir, look up Gian in the Palace (2F), and you will eventually get Gray (after a series of cut scene). Gray will also comment on pretty you (Claudia) are. At some point in the game, you may run into an assassin in Melvir. Please go to section RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias for the rest of the walkthru. Notes on the two guardian animals (Brau & Sylvan): At event rank 8, if you sleep at the inn (paying), you will trigger a cut scene and Quest 20, Eule gives a hoot. Once you go see Eule, the 2 guardians will leave you for good. The 2 guardians, similar to the Dragon Knight, cannot be dismissed by the minstrel, have their own attacks, and can only equip necklace and rings. This gives you 2 low maintenance characters, so you can focus your money and Jewel on Training Claudia and the other two members of the party. This make Claudia a good choice if this is your first play thru of the game. RS007E Jamil ------------- To be Added RS007F Sif ----------- To be Added RS007G Hawke ------------- As soon as you gain control of Hawke, you will start at the Coral Sea. Press start to take a look at the map, you are try to head for the middle exit in the NW corner (NW). Now go to the menu, position, and move Guella Ha to the middle spot (press down once on Guella Ha). Then go to weapons, and trade the Pirate's Gothic Axe with Hawke's Hand Axe. Next go to armor, unequip everything except the fur coat from the pirate and give them to Guella Ha. Finally, give the First Aid to either Hawke or Guella Ha (weapon). Now you are ready to set sail. The Lady Luck is nice and speedy, so you should be able to avoid fights. Head towards Cave C (the middle exit). There is no monster inside. Once again, open your map to see where you are going, and cruise to the Pirate Coast (No mobs once again). After you have arrived in the Pirate Coast, you will be informed that Butcher is calling a meeting. Go to the town hall (NE building). Eventually Butcher will challenge you to a duel, accept it. Head out, shop the supplies you need, and maybe train Hawke to a lv2 pirate. When you are ready, head back out to the Coral Sea. You will get another cutscene. Then, head back to the Pirate Coast and confront Butcher in the town hall. You can try and defeat him, or you can flee for your life. If you challenge him (win/lose), you will be kicked outside the town hall (no game over). Just head towards your ship for the next cutscene. You will end up in Godongo. Please go to section RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias for the rest of the walkthru. Please try to avoid as much fighting as possible, or your Event Rank might be too high. RS007H Barbara --------------- Barbara start at Weston and with quite a few towns around the new road open up. Just go into the Pub and talk to the minstrel to get a nice cut scene. After that, you will get the Amethyst Fatestone, and you are on your way to explore the world of Mardias. Please go to the next section, RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias for the rest of the walkthru. Please note that the Minstrel will disappear for a while. Eventually he will reappear after a few quests, so choose your party carefully and do not invite mercenaries. Note also that if you start the Wuhan's secrets quest, did not invite anyone and sacrifice Herman to Death (Escape until he dies), you can get capture just like Aisha. However, you do not need to do that as you can access S. Estamir thru N. Estamir to get the quest. But its fun. (Walkthrus for the other characters to be added) RS007Z Opening up the World of Mardias --------------------------------------- Once you are finished with the starting sequence, the first thing that I recommend you to do is to open up the world of Mardias. Recruit the other main characters into your party is the best way to open up the world, but there are other things to do along the way. Here is my checklist of things to do when you enter each new town: Please note: If you are playing as Albert, do not worry about opening the world until after you survive the ship wreck, get out of Valhalland, and met with Neidhart. 1) Pick up town maps from the volunteer brigade (little kid with a shiny badge) 2) Talk with NPCs around town to open new area (see list below) 3) Visit the pub and check the minstrel for stories. Also pick up your planned party members if any (see character section on where to recruit your party members) 4) Also recruit the other sub-characters/mercenary so you can strip their equipment and Balm. This will allow you to equip your party for free, as well as giving you some extra cash from selling the excess items. 6) Borrow Aisha's horse, you have to get it before the Taralians move (Yes, you can get it even if your main character is not Aisha. I just got it with Claudia). 7) Get the following quests: 5 Amethyst of Visions (You complete by recruiting Barbara) 6 Plain Treasure (Jelton Pub owner) 8 Unsettling Settlements (Yassi) 9 Innkeeper's Daughter (Melvir 2nd Floor Pub - Notice) 10 A suspicious Demise (Melvir Police Station) 11 Wuhan's Secret (South Estamir Pub) 15 Free the Gecklings (Oapu Pub) N.B. Someone will ask you to escort him in N. Estamir. This is for the Oh, Mummy quest (#25). Decline for now until you have the a full party 8) Take boat rides, there are only 2 worthwhile boat rides that you should pay for (for most characters anyway). Albert and Gray have to take a boat ride to advance their opening scenario. Oapu - Boat ride to Melvir 80G (so you can get Gray) North Estamir - Raft ride to South Estamir, it will be the best 10G you ever spent. Useful Party Members for Opening Mardias ---------------------------------------- Depending on who your main character is, you will be starting at different part of the world and run into the other main characters in different order. But the concept is (in no particular order): 1) Get to Melvir to pick up Gray, who opens up all the cities in Rosalia, Bafal Empire, Dry Lands and Ligau Isle (pretty much half of the civilized world as Mardias knows it, also open up the towns you need to find Barbara) 1a) As a bonus, you will always find Claudia with Gray, and she will open Mazewood for you. 2) Pick up Hawke from Uso to open up North Point and Godongo (You can reach Melvir by boat from Walon Isle, but need to pay fare) 3) Search the towns along the New Road and find Barbara (The New road stretch from North Point in Dry Lands, pass Rosalia and Kjaraht into the Frontier). She will open up Weston, New Road, Tarmitta, Crystal City, Altours, North Estamir, Uso, and North Point. I've seen her a few times in North Estamir's pub at start of a new game before any fighting. 4) Find Sif to open up Valhalland & Knight's Dominion (Mirsaburg & Eugenstadt) 5) Jamil can open up South Estamir, but much faster to take the raft ride from North Estamir. 6) Aisha opens up the Steppes of Galessa, but faster to ask the NPC in Uso. Helpful NPC that also Open up Mardias ------------------------------------- This is a list of towns with NPCs that open up area the 8 main characters don't open up. You should still visit every town for maps and equipment striping. Dry Lands --------- Uso (Open up by Gray): - A male NPC and the kid NPC on the west side of road opens up Kaklim Desert - A female NPC left of the magic shop opens up the Steppes of Galessa Rosalia ------- Crystal City (Open up by Gray): - Talk to the people in the pub to open up Crystal Lake and Mt. Scurve. (There are other NPCs in the city that unlock the Crystal Lake too). North Estamir: - Raft Ride to South Estamir (in the port), free. Just look for the small raft at the other dock. Yeoville: - If you can't find Sif... Boat ride to Mirsaburg (50G) Altours: - Talking to one of the NPC will take you to a fruit farm with a few trees and some enemies. Do not engage the insect enemies, but you can kill every thing else (move silently recommended). This will impact the fruit merchant's inventory in town. Bafal Empire ------------ Bruelle (Open up by Gray): - A female NPC *outside* the port area (in blue) opens Bayre Plateau - Boat ride to Mirsaburg (80G) (Yeoville is 50G). Sif opens it for free. Valhalland ---------- This area is opened by Sif Knights Dominion ---------------- Mirsaburg (Open by Sif, Boat ride from Bruelle): - An old man NPC (to the right of the road into the palace) opens up Eugenstadt Kjaraht ------- South Estamir (Jamil): - Raft ride to North Estamir Tarmitta (open by Barbara) - A male NPC outside the Apothecany opens Lake Malar Frontier -------- Weston (Barbara): - A female NPC near the entrance will tell you about Yassi, and Saoki later on Ligau Isle ---------- Jelton (Gray): - Exit Jelton by pressing triangle will take you to the plains. Note: If you have open up area outside of Jelton, you can use the world map exit on the Plain (SE corner) and then bypass Jelton back to the main land Coral Sea --------- This is Hawke's place, off limit till later Walon Isle ---------- Godongo (Hawke): - Exit town to get to the Jungle (no enemies) - Recruit Guella Ha in North Point for quest 15 before coming to Walon Isle Jungle: - Head East to open Oapu - You can access inner jungle and Geckling Cave Oapu: - Boat ride to Melvir Special Notes on Faerie's Grove ------------------------------- Once you completed the Amethyst of Visions quest by recruiting Barbara or dance for the Minstrel if you are Barbara, the Faerie's Grove will randomly appears in different places (the same will happen if you lose to the mummy in quest #25, but getting quest #5 done is the cleaner way to do it. If you see it, it is a good idea to visit it. Once there, try to talk to all the faeries. You need to keep visiting it until you get the Faerie's Grove quest (#26) started (after 2nd+ visit). When you exit, it dumps you in a random town. ============================= RS008 Tempering FAQ & Example ============================= Section Summary: RS008A What is Tempering? RS008B How to Temper & How to "Break in" a Weapon RS008C Tempering the Falcata RS008D Best Temperable Weapons List RS008E Armor Tempering RS008A What is Tempering? -------------------------- In Romancing SaGa, Tempering is the act of altering a piece of weapon or armor to make it stronger. It usually involves adding a tempering material to the piece of equipment. In addition, you can adjust the attack power (sharpness) and durability (sterdiness) of the equipment. Before we continue, you must understand the statistics of weapon and armor: Weapon (& how they are repaired): Attack - The Attack Power (or sharpness) of the weapon. The higher the number, the greater the damage. DP - Durability Point. This indicates the tolerance of the weapon before it breaks. Techniques can put a lot of stress on the weapon and cause it to wear. When it reachs 0, it must be repaired before it can be used again. An untempered weapon can be repaired at the smith or stay at the inn (paying, so they would repair the weapon for you). A tempered weapon, however, requires you to re-temper it with another piece of tempering material to repair the DP. DP Mod - The DP Modifier (sterdiness). This impacts the amount of damage a weapon will take when techniques are used. The higher the number, the more durable the weapon, the less damage it will take. Hence, positive DP Mod is good, especially when you are trying to break in a tempering material. Armor: Phy Def - Physical Defence Mag Def - Magical Defence Armor does not have durability point. RS008B How to Temper & How to "Break in" a Weapon -------------------------------------------------- Basically, your weapon can get stronger if you temper a harmonious material into it. You will know when the material is harmonious when the blacksmith show the material in red when you put your cursor on it. After you temper it, you will need to "break in" that weapon until the material is harmonious with the weapon (you will know when it changes its name to ???+1). "Breaking in" a material does not mean you have to use it until DP is 0. Rather, just keep using techniques with that weapon (it is perfectly fine even if they consumed no DP. In fact, that's the best way so you don't waste materials to re-temper the weapon). Tempering Examples and analysis: Let's start with a Kjar Bow and a beastfang. Go to the Blacksmith at Crystal City (inside weapon store). Select add my own materials and move your cursor to the beastfang. Notice beastfang is shown in red. It means the tempering material is harmonious to your weapon. Base on my tempering experiement with Bows and Scimitars, I have concluded that the base weapon determines the stats of the final form. If you use a weaker base weapon, you will end up with a weaker weapon in the end even if they share the same name. e.g. Steelsong from Falchion is 25 atk, Steelsong using Drachenbrand as base will have 34 atk. N.B. There are exceptions as always. If the final form can be tempered by more than one material, such as GrimCrystal vs DarkCrystal, that will impact the outcome of the weapon. You can tell a weapon is in its final form what it changes it name from ???+# to a different name. e.g. Kjar Bow -> Kjar Arbalest. I will explain the effects of tempering materials in the Kjar Bow example below. 1) Kjar Bow -> Kjar Arbalest: Kjar Bow can be tempered with any of Beast Fang, Tortoise Shell, and Reinforced Wing in its first form. For the purpose of my test. I ungraded two Kjar bow at the same time, the first one with beast fang and the 2nd one with Tortoise Shell. The beast fang gives higher attack, but also give you a -1 DP Modifier, and lowers max DP by 10. The tortoise shell improved attack slightly (I think), adds +1 to DP modifier (I think), and drops max DP by 20. I then modify the first bow to increase its durability so to get rid of the -1 modifier. Then both bow has the same damage... Except the tortoise shell bow now have an additional +1 to its DP modifier. It appears that better material does increase the power of the weapon for that "generation". However, the next generation required me to use a Steel Thread to upgrade it. Guess what, both bows ended up with exactly the same stats... Power, DP Modifier, Max DP, Weight Kjar Bow: Base Stat: 44, 0, 30 1st Generation: Beastfang: 52, -1, 20 Variation: 57, -2, 20 and 48, 0, 20 Tortoise Shell: 48, +1, 10 Variation: 52, 0, 10 and 44, +2, 10 Reinforced Wing: 57, -3, 10 Variation: 61, -4, 10 and 52, -2, 10 Evolve to Kjar Bow+1 2nd Generation: Steel Thread: 48, +1, 40 (Renamed to Kjar Arbalest, tested from Beast Fang and Tortoise Shell only) Variation, 52?, 0, 40 and 44, +2, 40 Final Form: 52, +1, 40 (Steel Thread is no longer shown as red) Variation: 57, 0, 40 and 48, +2, 40 If you temper the final form with another material, it is renamed to Kjar Bow+2. Adding a Tree Crystal to the Final Form would be 57, +2, 10, and can be treaked to 61, +1, 10. Kjar Bow+2 is easily one of the most powerful weapon in the game damage-wise, and also the easiest to temper. 2) Garal Shaft (Pole Arm) Halberd -> Halberd +1 -? Halberd +2 -> Garal Shaft N.B. Halberd step can be skipped by simply purchasing a Halberd +1. 3rd Generation Garal Shaft (per-final): Power +2: 49, 0, 20 Power +1: 45, 1, 20 Neutral: 42, 2, 20 Durability +1: 38, 3, 20 Durability +2: 35, 4, 20 Final Form (Neutral): 45, 2, 20 3) Morglay -> Morglay +1 (2-handed Sword) Morglay: 34, 0, 30 1st Generation: Vernie: ??? Morglay +1 (Final): Power+2: 47, -1, 20 Power+1: 44, 0, 20 Neutral: 40, +1, 20 Durability +1: 37, +2, 20 Durability +2: 34, +3, 20 I have yet to reach the final generation for this sword. Anyway, go ahead and experiment for fun. Just save before you try. By the way, Tree Crystal is an excellent material to use on the final form of your weapon as it increases the +DP modifier (+2) and attack (+1 degree). RS008C Tempering the Falcata ----------------------------- Before we even begin, let's get one fact clear once and for all: Unless you are playing as Gray, you will not be able to get the Voice of the Blade (Quest 7). Therefore, the Falcata cannot transform into the Demonbrand. As such, you are much better off with the Shooting Star (katana), which you can get from treasure chest (need treasure map). Here are the steps to acquire/temper the Falcata. Please also keep in mind that you should train Gray's Job Class to Master to help break in the sword. Saving enough Jewel to get his Katana skill to lv5 is a must. 1) When you are ready, come back to the plains, and jump down the Treasure Cave. (The cave entrance is on the SE side of the map, just east of the world map exit, with flowers outside.) You should go there with Lurk, Move Silently, Find Chest, Climb, and Jump to maximize your profit. 2) Head to Level 3 of the cave. The sword is right after the first turn. If you can see it, just move around and click X until you get it. You will get the Rusty Falcata. 3) When you are done picking up the chests and boss fight in the cave, head back to the town. You will see a cut scene where the sword say it wants to be tempered with a piece of Bronze (which is available in the Jelton blacksmith) 4) Now that you know how to properly "break-in" a tempered weapon, you can ignore what the Blacksmith say about breaking the sword. If you don't, read section RS008B. 5) After each evolution of the Sword, repeatly zone in and out of any pub until you get the cutscene which tell you what the next material they need. Falcata Tempering Summary ------------------------- Stage Material Location Rusty Falcata Bronze Jelton Blacksmith (BS) Falcata+1 Rosalian Steel Crystal City, Mirsaburg, N/S Estamir BS Falcata+2 Southern Iron Bruelle, Eugenstadt, Loban, S. Estamir, Gato's Village BS Falcata+3 Marcasite Sold in Altours, Aurefont Falcata+4 Steel Thread Sold in Aurefont Falcata+5 Meteoric Iron Most commonly dropped by Death Croacker (aquatic) but also from a few other types when your HP is 400+ Falcata+6 Mullock Not just any mullock, but rather an extremely rare type of Mullock. Mullock can be dropped, mined, and traded. But there is no reliable way to get the rare Mullock the sword need yet. Falcata+7 Boss Fight! Sword Demon, 16-17k HP!!! *Should you break the sword before you reach the next stage, you have to temper it again with the same material. **Since the boss fight is no pushover at 16-17, there is no rush to get your falcata level up to the max right away. So take your time to find the material. Just position yourself to do the quest at ER20 and you should be good. Notes on Meteoric Iron & Mullock -------------------------------- Not only are these 2 materials only, but they also drop the DP Mod to the negative zone. So until you have lv4+ Katana, you should hold off on the tempering. Otherwise you will have a really difficult time breaking in the sword. Getting the Mullock requires a lot of luck. The most logical route (well, according to my logics anyway) is to hope for a drop from a tough monster. It has been posted on the GameFAQ board that getting it from the Giant in Auldberg is the best bet to-date. Just make sure you make a clean save beforehand. Then go into Auldburg and fight the Castle Guardians until a Mullock Drop (quicksave before each one). If no Mullock drop, reset and try again. Once you killed them, take it back to the Blacksmith to see if any are harmonius with your Falcata +6. If not, load the clean save and try again. If you got it, Congratulations. It is also a good idea to assemble your best party/equipment for the upcoming boss fight. Falcata+7 and the Boss Fight ---------------------------- Once you "break-in" the Falcata, quick save before you enter town, because the fight will start when you enter. The Blade Demon is fairly tough, and can attack multiple times a turn, and have a few AOE attacks. Spells such as Revive and Self-Immolation will come in handy this fight. The best strategy here is to outdamage it. Once you win the fight. You will get the ultimate cutscene and see the Falcata+7 transform into the Demonbrand (55 Atk, 0, 30, str +10). It is one of the strongest weapon in the game. In addition, Gray's outfit changes. RS008D Best Temperable Weapons List ------------------------------------ Best Buyable Weapon List: Buyable Atk Cost Clout Where** Foil Vernie Rapier 21 4500G 9 Mirsaburg Short Sword Hanger 25 3100G 1 Bruelle Long Sword Schiavona 34 9000G 9 Mirsaburg Great Sword Rosalian Saber 24 2940G 1 Crystal City Scimitar Drachenbrand 33 7500G 7 Yeoville Hand Axe Throwing Axe 31 5390G 3 Melvir, Loban Club Cyclone Club 27 3900G 1 Crystal City 2-Handed Sword Morglay 34 7800G 7 Mirsaburg Katana Katana+1 25 4340G 12 Jelton 2-Handed Axe Great Axe 36 9500G 8 Bruelle Staff* Elemental Staff 9200G 9 Weiserheim Pole Arm Halberd +1 38 12900G 17 North Estamir Lance Garal Spear 33 8610G 15 Bruelle Bow Kjar Bow 44 19999G 17 Tarmitta *Staff is more for mage's casting than for tecniques... The Elemental Staff gives Int+1, Wil+1, All Element Resistance +10. **Some of these weapon are available in shops not listed. I try to keep the list limited to the major cities. I always go to the Blacksmith in Crystal City or Bruelle because they offer me the choice to temper in my own materials and have Vernie/Garal available. You will know when a weapon has reached its final form when it name changes. Once you have break-in the material for the final form, I highly recommend you to take it to a smith and see if tempering a tree crystal can help you make the weapon stronger. Quick save before you attempt this! Temper in the tree crystal, then adjust the attack and durability until it pleases you. 9 times out of 10 Tree Crystal will enhance your weapon. Also, there are a few generic tempering formulas such as 1) Rosalian Steel, Ligau Steel, Black Steel, Steel Thread Steel Thread Works best here because of the +2 DP mod with no penalty on attack power. 2) Marcasite, Meteoric Iron Usually there is another material to be tempered after this, so a Marcasite will suffice if you don't have Meteoric Iron. The Shock- proof effect you get from Meteoric Iron will be lost in the next tempering. Marcasite gives -3 DP Mod while Meteoric Iron gives -2. 3) Beast Fang, Tortoise Shell, Reinforced Wing Tortoise Shell works best in this group because it is the only one in the group to give a +DP Modifier I will now list the best weapons (temperable or otherwise) for each weapon type. Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. Reminder: "Break In" - a weapon is only considered to have broken in when the harmonius material is no longer in red. You can check this by selecting the weapon and press square to check on the material. Tempering Method Legend: ------------------------ I have listed and numbered the stage: Stage 0 is the neutral state that you start in. Stage 1 is the next stage, after you have break in the material from stage 0 Stage 2 , , stage 1 and so on You will also see me say "Add Tree Crystal after you break in the ???". Make very sure you have "Break in the material specified before you temper in the Tree Crystal. Otherwise you need to start over in the previous stage... You do not need to put in the tree crystal if you don't want to. I put it in because I like to have the +DP Mod, which reduce the wear and tear on my weapon so I don't have to worry about weapon breaking. Alternatively, you can try tempering in a Beastfang if you don't mind repair weapon, or that weapon has a high +DP mod already (You have to temper it again with a tempering material in order to repair the weapon). With the exception of the Falcata, any weapons that had been tempered via adding a meterial, even when its name changed, can only be repaired by tempering another piece of material to repair it. Usually you want to use the same material. Tree Crystal can be purchased, and so makes it a good choice to add the finishing touch on the weapon. Also, different weapons may share the same name after some tempering, but their damage will not be the same. Example, Steelsong made from Drachenbrand vs the Steelsong made from Falchion. Here is the Ultimate Weapons List: ================================== Welcome to Bladewind's Personal Arsenal! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHA This took me a long time to test and compile, so I truely hope you enjoy it. Foil: ----- The best buy-able foil is the Vernie Rapier (base weapon Rapier), and is already tempered to its final form. The Espada Ropera (39 atk) is the best foil and can be acquired from Quest 22 as well as from chests. However, you should also pay attention to the Blazing Sword as it can channels fire magic you've learned, and is temperable. Personally, I choose Blazing Sword over the vernie any day because foil user with hydrology magic can cast fire spells via the Blazing Sword. Silver Fleuret's Hunter's Fury Technique is not good as you can learn more powerful techniques. List of good Foils: Name Atk Notes Vernie Rapier 27 Just break in the vernie and add a tree crystal to make a Rapier +3, sold in Crystal City. Blazing Sword 15 Channels Fire Magic Espada Ropera 39 Best foil Sword Of Earth 36 LP Weapon (can't temper), Channels Earth Magic Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Vernie Rapier Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Vernie 1. Rapier+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Blazing Sword Elemental Core, Peggy Crystal 1. Blazing Sword+1 Vermillion*, Windshell (Elemental Core does not work) 2. Blazing Sword+2 Dark Crystal, Grim Crystal *Kudos to Jitawa for pointing out Vermillion, good job! 0. Espada Ropera Rosalian Steel, Ligau Steel, Black Steel, Steel Thread 1. Espada Ropera+1 Marcasite, Meteoric Iron 2. Espada Ropera+2 Vernie 3. Vernie Rapier Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Vernie 4. Espada Ropera+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Short Sword: ------------ List of good Short Swords: Name Atk Notes Hanger 25 Best buyable. Werewolf 27 Agi+1, drop from monster/chest Dragonscale Blade 37 Find Treasure, Fire/Cold/Elect. Resistance +10 Serpentbrand 27 LP Weapon, Int+5, Channels Water Magic, Cannot be tempered Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Hanger Souther Iron, Mullock 1. Hanger+1 Steel Thread 2. Steelgad Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Steel Thread 3. Hanger+2 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Werewolf Souther Iron, Mullock 1. Werewolf+1 Beast Fang, (Tortoise Shell, Reinforced Wing) 2. Beowulf Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Beast Fang 3. Werewolf+2 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Dragonscale Blade Beast Fang, Tortoise Shell, Reinforced Wing 1. Dragonscale Blade+1 Wind Shell (Elemental Core, Tree Crystal) 2. Wyrmbrand *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Long Sword: ----------- Schiavona is the workhorse of the long sword family. The Farangi has slightly higher attack, but has no special stats. Since it can only be found from treasure chests, you are better off using your Schiavona+3 and use the treasure map to pop better weapons such as the Shooting Star. List of good Long Swords: Name Atk Notes Schiavona 34 Best buyable. Farangi 39 Find Treasure Main Gauche 45 LP Weapon (Can't temper), 2 special attacks Acquired from Trial of Elore. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Schiavona Rosalian Steel, Ligau Steel, Black Steel, Steel Thread 1. Schiavona+1 Marcasite, Meteoric Iron 2. Schiavona+2 Garal 3. Garal Sword Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Schiavona+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Farangi Souther Iron, Mullock, Bismuth, Copper? 1. Farangi+1 Steel Thread, (Corundum) 2. Steelrend Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Farangi+2 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Great Sword: ------------ The best buyable Great Sword isn't really that great... I like the Raksha Sword better for the Str+3, and can be stripped from Silver. Raksha also have a better base attack than the Ogre's Cleaver. The Obsidian Sword, however, is one of the best weapon in the game. List of good Great Swords: Name Atk Notes Rosalian Saber 24 Best buyable... but not great at all Raksha Sword 29 Str+3, cannot be tempered, Chests, Strip Blue Saber 35 Status Ailments +20 Obsidian Sword 50 LP Weapon (Can't temper), Fatestone(all stats+1) Switch weapon mode, +20 resistance to Blunt, Slash, Aerial Attacks, nullify Bewitchery Magic Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Rosalian Saber Vermillion, Southern Iron 1. Rosalian Saber+1 Marcasite, Black Steel 2. Rosalian Saber+2 Vernie 3. Vernie Saber Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Rosalian Saber+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Blue Saber Elemental Core, Deadstone 1. Blue Saber+1 Native Silver, Electrum 2. Blue Saber+2 Tree Crystal 3. Blue Saber+3 Dark Crystal 4. Dark Blade *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Scimitars: ---------- If you do plan on playing Darque, this is the section for you. Phantombrand cannot channel illusion magic, so it is pretty useless with its low attack. List of good Scimitars: Name Atk Notes Drachenbrand 33 Best buyable... the workhorse of Scimitars Darque's Sword 44 You get it when you unlock Darque Red Peacock 40 Dex/Agi/Cha +3, cannot be tempered Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Drachenbrand Southern Iron, Mullock 1. Drachenbrand+1 Steel Thread, (Corundum) 2. Steelsong Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 3. Drachenbrand+2 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Darque's Sword Southern Iron, Mullock 1. Darque's Sword+1 Bismuth, Copper? 2. Darque's Sword+2 Steel Thread, (Corundum) 3. Sadalmelik (You can add tree crystal or beastfang) *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Hand Axes: ---------- Bilqis and Epic Hero have their own weapon skills, but LP weapons with average attack power and no DP Mod isn't that good... List of good Hand Axes: Name Atk Notes Throwing Axe 31 Best buyable... the workhorse of Hand Axes Cosmo Egg 47 LP Weapon, cannot be tempered, Vit+6 Can use Exnophobic Blast. You get it for defeating Pyrocanis Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Throwing Axe Ligau Steel, Marcasite, Steel Thread 1. Throwing Axe+1 Reinforced Wing, Windshell 2. Throwing Axe+2 Aerodyne 3. Falconwind Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Aerodyne 4. Throwing Axe+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Clubs: ------ Clubs aren't exactly the best weapon in RS... but they do have a powerful move called Grand Slam. It is a two hits attack against everybody, the initial strike doesn't do much damage... but the 2nd hit at the end of round is causes massive earth quake damage to the enemy. List of good Clubs: Name Atk Notes Cyclone Club 27 Best buyable... not bad but not great either Amber Jack 38 Treasure chest... I would use my treasure map for better weapons... cannot be tempered. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Cyclone Club Bronze, Blancazure 1. Cyclone Club+1 Southern Iron, Maracasite 2. Cyclone Club+2 Garal 3. Garal Hammer Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Cyclone Club+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Two-Handed Swords: ------------------ I personally find Sword of Death to be a terrible weapon... eventhough it gives 42 attack, the penalty of -20 Vit/COM/Status Ailments makes you too vulnerable to damage and status attacks. Furthermore, the Claymore has 43 base attack, and temperable to +DP Mod. Ice Sword on the other hand, is much more feasible because it negates self-immolation. List of good Two-handed Swords: Name Atk Notes Morglay 34 Best buyable... Wait for Claymore if you can Claymore 43 Chest drop, very nice damage Ice Sword (+1) 38 INT-20, Fire Resistance +20, Channels Aerology Aside from the one you give to Pyrix, there is also an Ice Sword +1 for sale in Ettinham for 30,000G. The best thing about this sword is its ability to negate self-immolation. However, the -20 Int puts a dent on your magic damage... Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Morglay/Claymore Southern Iron, Marcasite, Meteoric Iron 1. Morglay+1/Claymore+1 Blacksteel, Mullock 2. Morglay+2/Claymore+2 Vernie 3. Vernie Sword Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Vernie 4. Morglay+3/Claymore+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Katanas: -------- The best Katana is the Demonbrand, tempered from the Rusty Falcata (RS008C). Next to that is the Shooting Star. It is really a shame that you cannot dual wield in this game... The Crane Princess is also good (37 atk), but doesn't make the cut in the best weapon category. I will include the tempering instruction for it as well in case you get one. Ogre's Eye requires a rare Black Steel at stage 2, and judging by the material use, it has a potential to become a powerful weapon. However, it might also have -DP Mod and the damage won't match Demond Brand or Shooting Star. List of good Katanas: Name Atk Notes Demonbrand 55 Str+10, forged from Rusty Falcata (Gray only) Katana+1 25 Best buyable... but just weak... Crane Princess 37 Chest pop. Not bad, but there are better Shooting Star 45 Treasure Chest, Dex/Agi+3, Status Resistance+30 Best Katana if Gray is not your main. I love the power, stats and status resistance on this. Cannot be tempered. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Katana* Southern Iron, Marcasite, Meteoric Iron 1. Katana+1 Blacksteel, Mullock 2. Katana+2 Vernie 3. Vernie Katana Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Vernie 4. Katana+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *Katana is included because Katana+1 is sold out a lot... 0. Ogre's Eye* Ligau Steel, Southern Iron 1. Ogre's Eye+1 Blacksteel 2. Ogre's Eye+2 Dead Stone 3. Ogre's Eye+3 Meteoric Iron 4. Devilmark *Included this in case anyone got a black steel and want to try it 0. Crane Princess Ligau Steel, Southern Iron 1. Crane Princess+1 Marcasite 2. Crane Princess+2 Tree Crystal 3. Crane Princess+3 Meteoric Iron 4. Noble Crane *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Two-Handed Axes: ---------------- Most of the Two-handed Axes in this game are very good. Two of the unique axes gives Str+5/6, with no negative stats at all. Overall, the 2handed axes' high damage rating can maximize the damage from hit-all techniques like Earth Dragon and Grand Slam . The only draw back is that only 3 job classes can use them... Geckling Knight (Guella Ha), Imperial Knight, and Warrior. 12345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890 List of good Two-handed Axes: Name Atk Notes Great Axe 36 Best buyable... Good damage for a good price Vorpal Axe 40 Treasure Chest, very destructive Axe of Kings 30 LP Weapon (Can't temper), Str+5, channels Pyrology, can summon Pyrix. Its main use is for str boost and spells. Destroyer 49 Best 2h axe! LP Weapon (Can't temper), Str+6! Special Attack: Malefix Eclipse. Destroyer 42 LP Weapon (Can't temper), Int+6. Special Attack: Haunted Louse. I am guessing the int boost is to increase damage of special attack. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Great Axe Ligau Steel, Southern Iron 1. Great Axe+1 Marcasite, Steel Thread 2. Great Axe+2 Garal 3. Garal Axe Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Great Axe+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Vorpal Axe Dead Stone, Beast Fang, Peggy Crystal 1. Vorpal Axe+1 Dinosaur Skin, Stonefish Scales 2. Vorpal Axe+2 Toxic Talon 3. Executioner *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Staves: ------- Staves is more for boosting int than for doing damage. List of good Staves: Name Atk Notes Elemental Staff 18 Best buyable. Int/Wil+1, Fire/Cold/Elect/Energy Resistance +10. Cannot be tempered. Eule's Staff 10 LP Weapon, Int/Wil+3, Channels Demonology Mage's Staff 20 LP Weapon, Int/Wil+5, Channels Illusion Cannot be tempered. Serpent Staff 28 LP Weapon, Com+5, Channels Terrology Cannot be tempered. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Eule's Staff Elemental Core, Peggy Crystal 1. Eule's Staff+1 Tree Crystal, Windshell 2. Eule's Staff+2 Dark Crystal, Grim Crystal 3. Darkrung/Grimrung *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Pole Arms: ---------- I personally don't find the Khellendros very good, as I despise negative stats equipment (38 Atk, LP, Int/Wil/Com -10, elec. resistance +50). The Electricity resistance may come in hand against lightning mobs such as the gold dragon. However, you are better off a Garal Shaft for regular fights. List of good Pole Arms: Name Atk Notes Halberd+1 38 Best buyable, good damage. The merchant selling this is in the same block as the Martial Arts Yucomb's Trident 40 LP Weapon (Can't tempered), Channels Hydrology. Special hit all attack, Divine Lightning, Powerful and useful for mob clean up. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Halberd Ligau Steel, Bismuth 1. Halberd+1 Marcasite, Steel Thread 2. Halberd+2 Garal 3. Garal Shaft Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Halberd+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Khellendros Windshell 1. Khellendros+1 Toxic Talon, Grim Crystal 2. Nether Khellendros *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Lances: ------- I use lances a lot... It is the weapon of choice for Templar, and a backup weapon for my Kjar Sentinels. The Scorpion Lance is sturdy and reliable, and I've found one from chests and 2 dropped from Lizard Lords. A pre-tempered Garal Spear can be purchased in Bruelle for 8610G. However its base weapon is a spear so the damage will not be as good as a military fork. Nevertheless, you need a Black Steel/Corundum to temper Military fork+1 any further... So I personally prefer the Garal Spear over the Military Fork +1. The Malystrix share the same problem as the Khellendros (40 Atk, LP, Int/Wil/Com -10, Fire resistance +50), I personally don't think it is worth the -30 stats because a tempered scorpion can do more damage. List of good Lances: Name Atk Notes Military Fork+1 35 "Best" buyable, good damage. But the material needed to temper it further is very rare. The merchant selling this is in the same block as the Martial Arts. Garal Spear is a nice alternative with +2DP Modifier. Garal Spear 33 The +2 DP Mod more than make up for the 2 less atk points. Scorpion 37 Best lance, drop from normal chest and Lizard Lord, which appears when your HP >500. Feather Spear 35 LP Weapon (Can't tempered), Agi+5, Channels Aerology and you can summon the elemental king Avi. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Military Fork Rosalian Steel, Blancazure 1. Military Fork+1 Black Steel, Corundum 2. Military Fork+2 Garal 3. Garal Spear Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Garal 4. Military Fork+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Scorpion Sticky String, Steel Thread 1. Scorpion+1 Tortoise Shell 2. Scorpion+2 Reinforced Wing 3. Cor Scorpii Add Tree Crystal after you break in the Reinforced Wing 4. Scorpion+3 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious 0. Malystrix Dinosaur Skin 1. Malystrix+1 Toxic Talon, Dark Crystal 2. Nether Malystrix *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** Bows: ----- Unlike other weapons, the best bow is actually buy-able. Eres' Bow looks nicer but doesn't come close to a Kjar Bow+2. List of good Bows: Name Atk Notes Kjar Bow 44 Best bow. Can be tempered to 61 atk. Eres' Bow 35 LP Weapon (Can't tempered), can use Dreamshot. Tempering Method: Stage Material 0. Kjar Bow Beastfang, Tortoise Shell, Reinforced Wing 1. Kjar Bow+1 Steel Thread 2. Kjar Arbalest Add Tree Crystal after you break in the steel thread 4. Kjar Bow+2 No breaking in after tree crystal since not harmonious *** Please refer to RS009 for location of the material. *** RS008E Armor Tempering ----------------------- There is no Harmonius Material for Armor. Necklace and Rings cannot be tempered. The Garal set is the best armor you can buy, but that doesn't mean you should buy the whole set. Best Buyable Armor Summary: Buyable Cost Clout Where Shield Garal Shield 7695G 15 Melvir, North Estamir Helm Garal Helm 7790G 15 Melvir, North Estamir Chest Piece* Field Plate 12600G 12 Crystal City, Mirsaburg Garal Armor 23750G 18 Melvir Battle Mage Armor 6600G 6 Bruelle Gloves* Cyril's Bracer 5000G 4 Crystal City, Melvir Leg Pieces* Long Boots 432G 1 Northpoint Necklace Fang/Wing Amulet 500G 1 South Estamir Ring Guardian's Ring 5000G 5 Crystal City, Melvir Garal Shield and Garal Helm is worth the money. Aside from that, the other items from the Garal set is not worth it. Chest Piece ----------- - The Garal Armor is 57 Phy Def, 28 Mag Def, 38 Weight, but costs 23650G. - I prefer using a Garal Tempered Field plate at 60% of the cost. - Buy a Field Plate (12600G) and take it to the Blacksmith in Bruelle, temper in a Garal (740G). Then increase the PHY DEF twice (600G each time). Your new armor has 54 Phy Def, 32 Mag Def, 38 Weight, but cost only 14540G. - You can also temper in a dinosaur skin using the same steps for 57 phy def, 21 mag def, 33 weight. - Battle Mage Armor is a decent armor for mages... with okay defence and a small boost to int and wil. However, Scarlet Robe (Chest in Flammar's Tower) and Shimmering Sand Robe (Treasure Chest) provides better INT boost. Gloves ------ - High defence gloves have -dex stats. I don't like to see -stats, so I use the Cyril's Bracer instead. Immune to curse, WIL+3, Status Ailment +10. Leg Pieces ---------- - Metallic Leg armors will decrease the agi stat, so I use long boots instead. - Long boots can be tempered with Meteoric Iron (Shock immunity) for spell casters. The best armor are all from chests, treasure, and quest reward. Please see RS004B How to Use Treasure Map, Find Treasure, and Excavate for some of the items you can get. ============================== RS009 Tempering Materials List ============================== RS009A Buy-able Tempering Materials ----------------------------------- Material Clout Cost Location Aerodyne 14 2400 North Point Beast Fang 4 620 Godongo, Uso Bismuth 7 465 Aurefont, Godongo Blancazure 3 465 Aurefont, Jelton, Oapu Bronze 0 N/A Eugenstadt, Jelton, Mirsaburg Dinosaur Skin 21 9400 Weston Garal 0 N/A Bruelle, N. Estamir Ligau Steel 0 N/A Jelton, Loban Marcasite 15 1290 Altours, Aurefont Native Silver 0 N/A Bruelle, Crystal City, Mirsaburg Reinfored Wing 10 2340 Pirate Coast, Taralian Camp Rosalian Steel 0 N/A Crystal City, Mirsaburg, N. Estamir, S. Estamir Southern Iron 0 N/A Bruelle, Eugenstadt, Loban, S. Estamir, Gato's Village Steel Thread 12 2340 Aurefont Tortoise Shell 12 2280 Weston Tree Crystal 17 1290 Godongo Vermillion 5 465 Aurefont, Uso, Weston Vernie 0 N/A Crystal City, N. Estamir Material from Blacksmith also include the tempering cost, which is dependent on the weapon, therefore is listed as N/A. (Thanks Gundam4fun for adding Weston and Gato's Village) RS009B Dropped/Traded Tempering Materials: ------------------------------------------- Material Rarity Dropped by Black Steel Very Rare Cyclops and various monsters Corundum Very Rare Dark Crystal Very Rare Demon Lord Dead Stone Very Common Undead Type Enemies Devilsweed Seed Rare Drop/Trade with Plants Electrum Common Unknown Type Enemies Elemental Core Common Elemental (Unknown Type Enemies) Ghost Silver Very Rare Deepfish (looks like ghost ship) Grim Crystal Very Rare Specter, Soul Drain Meteoric Iron Common Death Croaker (frog), Dehydrated Plants, Stone Beast and Other mobs when your HP is at 400+ Peggy Crystal Common Peggy (common from Peggy Striker) Pure Gold Rare Gold Dragon and Alsak Sticky String Very Common Catepillar Type (Insect Enemy) Stonefish Scales Very Rare Dropped by Petrified Fish, Juscony, Deepfish, Abyssal Maroda, Guardian Beast,Drake, Trade with Aquatics Toxic Talon Very Rare Ifrit, Zombie Dragon, Gelion, Abyss Lord, Amul Amut (Trial of Elore) and Alastol (Trial of Elore). Windshell Very Rare Dragon Turtle, Zaratan (Trial of Elore), Great Sky Dragon, Wyrmfounder (Trial of Elore). Other monsters known to drop ores per Ultimania guide: Ogre, Cyclops, Ogre Lord, Ogre Champion (Trial of Elore), Mountain Man, Netherworld Root, Stone Beast, Death Croaker, Cackatrice, Gargoyle, Nut, Slime (all colours), and Frozen Corpse Thanks again to Gundam4fun for finding Stonefish Scales, and Kenton for providing the information from the Ultimania guide. RS009C Tempering Materials Stats Modifier ------------------------------------------ Here is a compiled list of known raw material and their impact on an untempered weapon. Legend: Material: Name of Material Attack: the degree of attack power increased (not the actual value increased) DP Mod: Increase/Decrease to DP Mod DP (x10): the degree of impact on durability Example: Rosalian Saber (24, 0, 30) If you take it to a blacksmith, and select increase attack power, it would change it to (26, -1, 30). In my chart, it can be read as Increased Attack by 1 degree, -1 DP Mod, 0 DP (x10)... or simply: [Tempering] 1 -1 0 If you increase the attack power again to (28, -2, 30) It becomes: [Tempering2] 2 -2 0 Material Attack DP Mod DP (x10) Resistance Aerodyne +1 -1 -1 Beast Fang +2 -1 -1 Bismuth -3 +1 +3 Blancazure -2 +2 0 Bronze -3 +1 +1 Dead Stone +5 -1 -5 Devilsweed Seed -1 +1 -2 Dinosaur Skin 0 +2 -1 Electrum -1 +3 -1 Elemental Core +2 -2 -2 Garal 0 +2 +1 Ligau Steel +1 0 -1 Marcasite +2 -3 0 Meteoric Iron +2 -2 -1 Shock Native Silver -1 +2 -1 Peggy Crystal 0 +1 -1 Pure Gold -2 +1 -1 Reinfored Wing +3 -3 -2 Rosalian Steel 0 +1 0 Southern Iron 0 -1 +2 Steel Thread 0 +2 +1 Sticky String -2 +3 0 Stonefish Scales 0 +1 -1 Hydrology Tortoise Shell +1 +1 -2 Tree Crystal +1 +2 -2 Vermillion 0 -1 +1 Vernie +1 +1 -1 ========================= RS010 Fusion Magic List ========================= Imperial Scholar and Rosalian Mage can fuse spells together to cast Fusion spells. To create a fusion spell: first, change job into a rosalian mage or an Imperial Scholar. Then, open the spell menu of the character and press triangle. You now have access to the fusion spell creation menu. RS010A Fusion Spell List and Usage ---------------------------------- Fusion Spell BP/LP Usage Song of Souls 13/1 Give evereyone in party Flame of Life Crimson Flare 21/2 Target one enemy for immense fire damage (-int) Overdrive 20/3 Give casters a number of free turns, only cast can move Hasten Time 30/4 Gives the party one extra turn. Everyone in party can move. Whiteout 15/4 Create Whiteout condition to cover party's escape Simulacrum 25/3 Summon a snowman to fight in caster's place. Petra Delta 15/1 Unleash petrifying gas (cone shape) Wallbreaker 13/1 Nullify everyone's (ally+enemy) magic barrier Phantom Shield 12/2 Create illusion to block attacks Veil of Fog 9/1 Increase chance of combo for 1 turn Anti-Magic 10/0 Cast Magic Shield effect on self/1 ally Shield Breaker 10/1 Dispell an enemy's magic shield Galatic Rift 13/2 Attack all enemies Andromeda 20/2 Nullify all damage this turn for both sides Spirit Barrier 16/1 Half damage of allies this turn Rain of Life 20/5* Heal your party's HP (LP Cost is one per party member) Just keep in mind there is more than one way to fuse a spell than what is listed below. Feel free to play around with it. It does not matter what combination of spells you chose to fuse, the casting cost will always be the same. The BP/LP cost can be lowered by the magic level of the mage. Most Fusion Formulas below needs to be done in order listed. RS010B Imperial Scholar Fusion Formulas --------------------------------------- Fusion Spell BP/LP* Fusion Formula Song of Souls 8/1 Flame of Life + Summon Elemental (or Self-Immolation) Hasten Time 25/1 Fold Time + Snowstorm Petra Delta 10/1 Pulverize + Mind Blast Anti-Magic 5/1 Armor Blessing + Enhance Spells Galatic Rift 10/0 Cosmic Tide + Strengthen Pull Rain of Life 15/5 Way of Focus + Holy Water * At Level 5 Imperial Scholar RS010B Rosalian Mage Fusion Formulas ------------------------------------ I play around with the formulas and rearranged all of them to only 2 schools. This way, you can focus your jewel usage. There are many many combinations to create fusion spells and are not limited to what is listed here. Fusion Spell BP/LP Fusion Formula Song of Souls 8/1 Flame of Life + Summon Elemental + Self-Immolation Crimson Flare 16/1 Hell Fire + Revive + Sunray Overdrive 15/0 Fold Time + Freeze Time + (Hypnotism/Mind Blast) Hasten Time 25/1 Fold Time + Snowstorm + (Water Blast/Summon Elemental) Whiteout 10/3 Missile Shield + Summon Elemental + Starbeam/Cosmic Tide Simulacrum 20/2 Summon Elemental(Wind) + Snowstorm + Holy Water Many possible combinations Petra Delta 10/1 Earthen Grasp + Pulverize + Mind Blast Wallbreaker 8/1 Tremor+Aegis+(Way Of Str./Wave of Life/Mark of Awake.) Phantom Shield 7/1 Phantom Warrior + Fire Illusion + (Sunray/Starbeam) Veil of Fog 4/0 Hypnotism + Lightning Illusion + Holy Water/Fold Time Anti-Magic 5/0 Enhance Spell+Mind Blast+(Way Of Str/Focus/Wave of Life) Shield Breaker 5/0 Shockwave + 2 Fire spells (Hell Fire + Bird of Fire) Galatic Rift 10/1 Sun Ray + Cosmic Tide + (Water Blast/Bird of Fire) Andromeda 15/1 Star Beam + Starlight + Hypnotism Spirit Barrier 11/0 Way of Def+Way of Str+(Flame of Life/Self-Immolation) Rain of Life 15/5 Wave of Life + Wave of Focus + (Fold Time/Freeze Time) ========================================================== RS00Q Interesting Questions from the GameFaq Message Board ========================================================== These are some of the more interesting questions I've seen onthe GameFAQ board. I figure I would share it with you. Q1: Okay,newbie here.And i need help *ASAP* Q2: This game would be MORE FUN if i could do many quests(HELP) Q3: How to make a healer? Q4: RPG Etiquet Q5: What is a Benediction and How to Increase my Favor with the Gods? Q6: OMG!!Jewel beast!! Q1: Okay,newbie here.And i need help *ASAP* (from lilfairy) ----------------------------------------------------------- "Yea...i start with claudia(tried aisha first,but sucks) besides,i like archer types. And...please explain to me about all STATUS in Romancing saga.What the hell is WIL??Explain everything,please. And about weapon...i know claudia uses a bow,so where can i find it? The first one was totally a lame. Claudia...Is she a good magic user?What spell i should put on her? Btw,i dun really understand about the whole spells things.So i guess i need explanation too. How do u activate....oh my,i forget-the one u use to find treasure chests?And how do u i do requests?There seems no one request yet... oh,if u need to know,i just played this game.Err,about one hour ^^ And tech,do i have to go in battle,so i can gain new?Or other way? I know i asked A LOT.But please explain,cuz i dun think that lil' boy in the game has explained enough -_- thanks a lot before" My Answer: ---------- He was not kidding about asking a lot of questions... 1) Definition of various character stats: STR - Attack power for melee weapon VIT - How well you can take a hit DEX - Accuracy and Bow damage AGI - Attack Speed INT - Magic Attack WIL - Magic Resistance COM - Healing Power CHA - Accuracy of status inflicting magic/skills 2) Big cities tend to have better weapon and armor for sale than starting cities. However, you will need to improve your clot with the merchant before they sell you better stuff. You can improve your clot by buying and selling stuff at any merchants. Kjar bow is the best buy-able bow, and can be tempered into a Kjar Arbalest. See my thread on Buyable Tempering Materials FAQ. 3) There is no class restrictions to characters, meaning you can change their job to suit your playing style. All you need to do is visit a skill trainer. As for magic, there are 10 schools of magic that are paired up as opposing elements. Pyrology <-> Hydrology Aerology <-> Terrology Bewitchery <-> Sorcery Demonoloy <-> Illusionary Cosmology <-> Necromancy Although you can learn spells from all the school, you can only use spells from one of the opposing school at a time. [Additional Note] For example, Fire (Pyrology) opposes Water (Hydrology) I taught Claudia both sets of magic, but only have Hydrology activated... which means I can only use Water magic. You can switch to the opposing school by visiting a temple/spell merchant that sells magic from the desired school to activate it (but it will cost you). Note: You can bypass this by using a weapon that can channel the opposing element. In this case, I can equip Claudia with a Blazing Sword (which channels Pyrology) to give Claudia Access to fire magic. Please note that when you use a weapon to channel magic, it is the weapon's skill level that impacts your spell level. 4) Activation Proficiency: While you are in town, press square to open up the menu, then go to Proficiency menu and equip the skills there (cannot equip when you are outdoor). You can learn these skills from the skill trainer. To increase the level of the skill, such as find chest, increase the corresponding map skill... in this case, Search. If your Search is level 2, your Find Chest skill will also be Lv2. 5) Getting quests: Just go around talking to people. Certain quests require you progress further into the story before you can activate it. The game automatically classify it as quests, request, stories, rumors, etc. for you 6) You will learn techs during battle, usually when fighting tough enemies. Raising your weapon skill (e.g. Katana) will unlock the cap for you to learn more powerful techniques. Q2: This game would be MORE FUN if i could do many quests (also from lilfairy) ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ "oh My GOD.I've been playing for about 2 hours.And no quest at all.And what i have been doing is just hanging around like crazy.Do some battles to gain gold and jewels or items.This is crazy.What i got just rumors...no quest at all. er,i played as claudia.Melvir,mazewood,???(forget the name),and the two cities which we can reach by boat from melvir.(duh,forget the name too)are available. But i want other city. Please tell me...I dunno what to do.I want to do some quests.I wanna recruit some people... had no idea at all.. and thanks before" My answer (recreated for this guide): ------------------------------------- Romancing SaGa can be very overwhelming if this is your first time playing it, and that's okay. The point of a SaGa game is about how the hero (you) journey the world and eventually confront the evil god that seeks to destroy it. A lot of focus has been placed on adventuring and exploration. If you understand this concept, then you will do well in this game. After the introduction sequence, you are pretty much left to fend for yourself. In order to proceed with the game, you must: 1) Explore - the world is out there waiting for you to find your adventure. Try and open up as many places as you can. 2) Make friends - along your travel, you will come across fellow adventurers and Kindred spirits that are trying to accomplish something or just out there looking for trouble. It is a good idea to invite them into your party as some of them have good information to share. For example, Gray, being a seasoned adventurer, will open up a lot of areas for you if he is not the main character. Barbara and Claudia can take you to places only they know about. There are more characters that can unlock areas, and I will let you find them out. 3) Take a boat ride! Ships is a good way to take you to a new port you have not been to before. 4) Talk to the citizens and help those in need - as with any RPG, talking with stationary NPC usually give you some info, that includes opening up additional areas. 5) Beginning quests: Check out towns like North & South Estamir, Yassi (Frontier), Melver (Bafal Empire), and Jelton for starting quests. Q3: How do I make a healer in this game? (from Run ANT83) --------------------------------------------------------- "Ok, I have no idea how to make a healer for this game. What spells should I focus on? What stats make a good healer? In my party of Gray, Sif, Gian, Claudia, and Barbara, who would make a good healer? thanks in advance for any responses" My answer: ---------- (Re-created for this guide) First off, let's take a look at the healing spells. There are 2 healing spells that can heal other people, Healing Water and Moonbeam... Moonbeam is the more powerful of the two. If you can afford the jewels, go with Moonbeam. The must have spells for Early stages: 1) Use Moonbeam (Cosmology, Melvir Temple + various spells merchant) 2) Use Holy Water (Hydrology, Melvir Temple + various spells merchant) Also, the Com stats effects your healing power. So Com boosting equip is good... but also pay attention to the speed of the character. Healing spells goes off fairly quickly, but it is also a good idea if your healer can pull off a heal before the enemy kill one of your party member and waste the turn. Middle stage: 3) Equip everyone with Way of Focus (Bewitchery, Crystal City Temple) 4) Flame of Life (Pyrology, Flammer + various spell merchant) 5) Various buffs like Aegis, self-immolation, armor blessing, way of defence Way of Focus is cheaper than Moonbeam's BP cost, but can only heal yourself. It is very helpful in boss fights especially after they use a hit all attack. You should also start looking into shock=proof eqiupment. My suggestion is Long Boots temper with Meteoric Iron (your mages should be the priority for this) End game (good to have, but not necessary): Fusion spells *You must be a Rosalian Mage or Imperial Scholar to use these* 6) Rain of Healing 7) Flame of Life Personally I did fine against Saruin without using the fusion spells. I find them too BP/LP costly. Jobs for healers: If you plan to use fusion spells for your healers, I would recommend you go with either a Rosalian Mage or an Imperial Scholar. However, you need to be mindful of the LP costs of those spells. The high BP cost also mean you will not be able to spam these spells. Alternatively, you can use the Legendary Classes, which gives you a -2 LP modifier to your spell costs. While this isn't much for the healing spells, it goes a long way for the buffs. The best healer would be Cleric, followed by Bard and Fortuneteller. Both Cleric and Bard receive the full bonus from Cosmology, which would be the main healing spell you use in the absence of fusion spells. In addition, you can also use these job classes offensively when they are not healing. For my Aisha game, her job is Cleric. She is not only a powerful healer, but also an accomplished Martial Artist. I have purposely omitted my pick for who become the healer in this party. It is up to you, the player to decide. With Romancing SaGa, it is really up to you how you play the game. You can make Cloud that healer/flower boy, and Aeris the might swordsmaiden if you want. It might take a little longer to raise the COM stats, but it will go up in time. Q4: RPG Etiquette (Started by XBaralai on the Game FAQ Board) ------------------------------------------------------------- I just have to share this: So, I've noticed all these questions on how this place is opened up and that place is opened up and how do you get this quest to start and what not. It makes me think that alot of people have never played an RPG. So, in that light, let's go over the common RPG rules. 1. Talk to everyone - don't let a single person go without you talking to them at least twice, sometimes 3 times. 2. Check everything that can be checked - I don't care if it's your character's grandma's underwear drawer..CHECK THEM! 3. If all else fails - go back to step 1.. people's dialog changes. 4. If you've tried steps 1-3 and still no luck then it's safe to say that you need help. (And Jati No Rei have the following to add) yes, this game is actually nice in that once you have talked to someone, they almost always become inactive, allowing you to narrow down who it is you need to talk to w/o wondering if that is the same guy with green hair you already talked to. RS is actually different enough from your average RPG that a few new things should be added to that list. 5) for the first bit of the game, only keep 4 characters and use that 5th slot to recruit and then dismiss new people to unlock new areas. 6) constantly check back with the Volunteer Brigade and see if you've gone up an event rank. Everytime you have, go back to those cities where nothing was happening and see if that's different now. 7) don't bother trying to "level up" if the random enemies are too hard, as they will only get harder as you get stronger. Rather, wait till you've come upon a boss that is just too strong, then try to increase your strength before fighting them again. 8) if you are fighting a strong boss and die, wait for a minute to see if you get the Game Over screen or if you are kicked back into the dungeon, as there are a decent number of fights you can lose w/o getting a game over, and some of them are great for sparking techs off of. (Finally, from JessieDeAlkirk) Aw, we forgot the number one rule of RPGs: If people tell you not to do something, you must immediately go out and do that thing. If people tell you to do something, you must also go out and do that thing, but it is possibly not as important as when they tell you not to do it. But that really just goes hand-in-hand with talking to everyone multiple times if you can. Every RPG player knows this rule, it just makes me smile that it's in every game. Ever. Thanks guys & gal! Q5: What is a Benediction and How to Increase my Favor with the Gods? --------------------------------------------------------------------- A benediction is a favor from the gods and occurs when you are in dire needs. It will do anything from healing your entire party to obliterating your enemy. However, your favor with the god must be high enough... When you do Vortexes and buy spells from the corresponding temple of the gods, you increase your favor with them. Once a Benediction with that god occurs, you lose 25% of your favor with them... which you can regain by doing more Vortexes or buying more spells. Q6: OMG!!Jewel beast!! ---------------------- I am extracted pieces from this interesting post: From: Rathalos89 can any1 tell me wat exactly trigger the appearance of Jewel Beast?... it came out destroying every town of frontier after i killed the vampire.... From: Gundam4fun One way to prevent the Monster from awakening too early in the game or until you are strong enough to take on it, is to complete ALL 3 of those quests: Unsettling Settlements The Fiends of Saoki Return of the Vampires And if possible wait until later in the game to complete the Assassin Guild quest.... If you complete ALL those 3 quests it will hold the JB from awakening at least until ER 18-19..... From: Gundam4fun Even if you do all other 3 quests, just wait longer to take the Assassin Guild quest (you can wait until latter in the game since this quest window is ER 14-20), because the Jewel beast will awake up after you complete the Assassin Quest, the minions in this quest talk about wake up the jewel beast.... From: Diablomon Hahaha like a Moron I took on JB and it's Jewel Beam "OVERKILLED" me :) That word actually appeared on screen it was ******* hilarious From: AvalonSharpe So, what stats am I going to need to take this thing on, when it's at full strength, sitting on top of Weston pub? And is it's Jewel Blaster a Physical or Magic attack? Any resistances that'll block it? Any special tactic? Will I need Alkaizer change? Will it let me defeat it if I gave it an Internet cookie? Should I use Kamehameha? :( (The last three were jokes, if you didnt notice.) From: BladewindDraconus This puppy only has 30k HP. XD The best way to survive his attack is with revive and body doubles, such as the fire elemental (which can also cast revive!). Healing your characters to full is pretty pointless when he can 1 shot your entire party's HP... but not if you cast revive on your characters first! Whoever have revive status is automatically restore to full HP after they lose all HP. So if you manage to setup your revive, you can use Jewel Blaster for "healing"! (Dragon Knight comes with auto-revive, but you need to protect his 5 LP with a fire elemental) In order for such a setup, it is a good idea that everyone can cast revive, moon beam, and fire elemental. The role of reviver and damage dealer needs to be interchangable. The ideal setup would see 1-2 fire elemental (double as revivers) or people defending while getting BP, plus 3 damage dealers on the field. Your goals are: 1) have refresh on everybody at all time, so you don't need to heal raise and then cast revive on them 2) Try and deal at least 1k of damage every round, the more the better. Just keep the beast hard pressed. It will take a bit of luck to get revive on everyone. But once you survive that, have 3 people focus on damage while the other 2 members keep revive up on everybody. As long as you can out-revive the Jewel Beast, you can keep chewing your nails. It is also a good idea to keep the reviver safe by using a fire elemental in their place once revive is up. Fire elemental can also cast revive. Finally, you should either recharge your BP, or try and 2nd guess who JB is going to kill next, and cast revive on them (the odd is not bad since you are only precasting on 3 people, and you gets two chances). Example: On the same turn, Jewel Beast Kills Gray. Since Gray has revived on, he is revived to full HP. One of your revivers 2nd guessed the jewel beast correctly and recast revive on Gray. In terms of attack, alternate heavy and light attacks. Use cheap BP attacks to pull off scissors or the occassionally stallion/dragon, then unleash your BP when you have enough to do a power attack. Claudia's high bp regen is keyed to doing 2k damage a round, so she should be your top priority to keep revive up. If your reviver has BP built up, switch them to DD to make use of the BP. There is no point saving it because if you get killed without revive on, you lose all the BP you saved. In terms of equipment, high damage weapons is highly desirable. You will just have to repair them after. (Just so you have an idea, I gave Claudia 2 Kjar Bow+2 and a scorpion+3 lance). Also, keep track of the amount of damage you've done, so you know when to unleash an all out attack on him. Launch it when you can kill him in about 2 turns. With persistence and a lot of luck, you can take down this puppy without Overdrive. ==================================== RS00Z Thank You Notes, Legal, etc. ==================================== I hope this FAQ helped you out. I have to sacrific a lot of game time to test and then write down this stuff... I want to play! ; ; Special Thanks to Gundam4Fun for corrections, information, and confirming some of my theories, etc. It is very nice to have someone to bounce your idea off of when you write an FAQ, especially something of the SaGa magnitude. Also a big thank you to everyone on the game FAQ RS Board. It is the best RS board I've seen to-date, and some of you have helped me verify stuff, make me clarify stuff and point out certain stuff in this FAQ. So yea, that's a lot of good stuff! Also, this board is filled with a lot of elite RPG players, including a few die-hard SaGa nuts, and that's an awesome thing! If you need to look for me, post on the GameFAQ board. I will try and answer your question, if these guys didn't beat me to it first. It really pleases me to see some of these guys goes from SaGa-n00bs to SaGa-Pros helping everyone out. Good job! Sources/legal/etc: Romancing SaGa, PS2, published by Square Enix The job listing information is extracted from Romancing Saga Game. The event ranks is extracted from the Brady Game Guides. Please let me know if I keyed anything incorrectly, or you want it updated. You will find me on the gamefaq messageboard. This guide is to be posted on the gamefaq website only. You can copy and paste the info from here to the gamefaq board, as long as you give credits to this FAQ. Thanks! Copyright 2005 Bladewind Draconus