SO: TTEoT

[Proxy]

So yeah, I'm far too lazy to type out the full title, but Star Ocean 3.
How did everyone level? Did any of you get to 255 on normal, mode?
Where did you level and with what gear to get maximum experience.
Tips? Tricks? Strategy?

Me I've never reached 255 yet, but I hope to, as I am playing through again. So I need tips and such.

[Zeromus_X]

The best way to easily max out all of your characters in just a few hours is to get five fully refined Rings of Erudition (totals to five +20% Exp factors, for a maximum of +100% Exp), and Synthesize them all to a Laser Weapon. Equip it to a dead character, and put them in your party with two other characters you want to level (or one, if they're powerful enough). You may want to synthesize Freezing to their weapon (Shell Sapphire, use Ansala or wait until you can purchase them) to kill off monsters faster.

Go to floor 186 of the Sphere Company building; you'll find the frog and snake enemies there. I wouldn't recommend fighting any of the other enemies though. This combination of enemies, along with the Triple Exp Bonus Battle Guage, and the +100% Exp from five Rings of Erudition will net you 1,000,000 Exp with one character alive, and 500,000 Exp with two. About 300,000 with three. I usually max out my team one or two at a time, depending if I need to level Sophia or Adray or something. Freezing them is faster if you have two people, otherwise just use the most powerful but quick attacks for whatever character you're leveling. The frogs are incredibly slow, so you should be able to evade their attacks without difficulty. Just watch out for the snakes, they'll self-destruct if you don't kill them in time when they're at critical HP, and thus you'll lose experience.

Fayt: Ethereal Blast or Air Raid
Sophia: She can attack and Freeze them.
Peppita: Kaboom or Faerie Friend
Cliff: Max Shockwave
Nel: I haven't used Nel in awhile. I guess Mirror Slice, Divine Wrath, or Splitting Sky (they shouldn't have a resistance to wind)
Roger: Raging Helmet
Adray: Southern Cross
Maria: Energy Burst
Albel: Short X Attack Combo. Preferably with Increase HP/MP damage, but if he has the Victory Trophy you'll be able to Freeze them even better.
Mirage: Um...I guess she can be a shatter-killer.

Basically you'll want to either a.) kill them in the most efficient way possible with the above Battle Skills or b.)Freeze them with one character, and then have someone else attack the frozen enemy for an instant kill. Both methods are more efficient if you manually control your characters.

This is of course if you've explored Sphere 211. If you're in the Maze of Tribulations, you'll want to shatter-kill the two-headed dragon enemy at the bottom for 30,000 exp a kill with triple exp and three characters. This is an efficient leveling method until you reach level 100 or so.

That about covers it. I wouldn't recommend leveling up every character, just the characters in your party. Always make sure you have a low level character in case you need to fill up the Bonus Battle Gauge again.

[sephirothishere]

Sounds fun. I bought 'Til the ends of time the other day because I saw it in a store for about 10 euros. I intend playing it after I have finished or gotten bored of Final Fantasy XII. In the original SO, I didn't find it necessary to level past 100.

[Zeromus_X]

I never level past 60 in that game. xD I wonder how long it'd take someone to reach 255 in that one...

In SO2/SO3, it's alot easier to reach the maximum level, though.

[Proxy]

Sweet dude, thanks, I'm printing that off right now haha.
I'll give it a shot.

[sephirothishere]

Hmph... it was quite hard to level up in that game. If I recall correctly, the easiest way to do it in SO 1 was to fight a chick called Gabriel ;d? Meh.

[Zeromus_X]

Yeah, but I can't imagine maxing out your levels with 12,000 exp a battle. :p

[LunarWeaver]

I couldn't even level up enough to beat the game at all let alone hit the max level. I do know somebody who had the max in End of Time, though. He had done pretty much everything in the game and his clock was at around, oh, a billion hours. That be some value kids!

[Proxy]

The battle with Luthar was a challenge. The first time I played it that is. Second time around I was around level 100 when I fought him, so he was toasted.

[Zeromus_X]

On my first file on Earth mode it must've taken me a billion tries. Of course then I didn't understand the battle system or item creation at all.

On my Galaxy file it was pretty easy, mostly because I had played it before on Earth but then I understood the game alot better.

On my Universe file I cheated with Orichalcum. :( I'll never use them again.

It took me about twenty minutes of Air Slash/Peppitalbel counter spam to keep myself safe and take him out on 4D mode. Now that's what I call a difficulty mode.

[LunarWeaver]

So is this a good time for me to admit I thought the battle system was like the boring version of a Tales game or what.

[Zeromus_X]

It's probably just because it requires a bit more strategy than the Tales games. :)

[LunarWeaver]

Don't you get cheeky with me, Mister Not-White Mage Blasphemor! It's not strategy, it just requires more care because the AI is dumber than Kairi for most of the game. Whatchoo got, go on now.

[Zeromus_X]

The AI in most Tales games isn't much better. xD (Fond memories of Genis running up to attack enemy when he runs out of TP) And the AI in SO3 all depends on how you level it. Of course, no computer controlled character will ever be as effective as a human controlled one, but the AI is generally reliable when Attack and Defense are leveled to about 4.

In the Tales games, it's pretty much block, avoid magic (in later games) and wait for an opening to combo the living daylights out of the enemy. And maybe you'll equip certain equipment for elemental resistance. In Star Ocean 3 the combination of Fury (no button mashing), Minor and Major attacks and AAAs (you can't just constantly attack either), and sidestepping and counters to avoid attacks, give its battle system much more thought than that of any of the Tales games I've played. I'm not saying that Tales games are devoid of any strategy, because that obviously isn't true, but SO3 has proven to me that it has the most strategic battle system of any action RPG I've had the pleasure to play.

Although, I will admit I've gotten into the habit of just controlling all of the characters manually since playing on the higher difficulty levels.

[Lawr]

Is it OK if I tell my allies to "Act In A Well Balanced Manner" and they run to the corner and do NOTHING!? I had fun killing Luther with Maria...

[LunarWeaver]

But Tales games are devoid of strategy.

In Tales games, I can at least tell them to stop using TP at a certain point and to avoid the enemy. Tales of the Abyss and Legendia even let me precisely monitor it at all. I can also turn on and off all their abilities, and all are always at their disposal unless I want otherwise. They're also just innately smarter. In Star Ocean, everybody just pulls a Quina and does whatever the fuck they feel like. Plus, in a Tales game I can freeze the game to lock on to somebody and actually hit them, not have them move and make my character swing in place like a moron.

Any way you cut it, having to level up the AI's intelligence is a ludicrous concept. It's like having a "Glitch" stat and making the game really buggy until you put points into it and make the glitches go away. It doesn't make any sense! Why not just make it good to begin with? IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE *chokes nearest object*

Oh, that's all pish-posh anyway. Tri-Ace just can't figure out how to make a blocking animation, so they introduced Fury to take care of it for them.

The game isn't bad, I just think it does a lot of things for the sake of being annoying. Like keeping Sophia out of my party until the real plot starts 80 hours into the game. Then making her level 1 when everybody else is 5,000. It's a little thing that doesn't break the game but just stacks up. Like the map system-- it's not broken but it's not good either. All these things add up in every tri-Ace game I play and it frustrates me.

You know I'm not going to stop trolling Star Ocean topics until you admit Xenosaga is better. Ban me now and save yourself. I hope you ache from the mass hypocrisy since Xenosaga games are also flawed and also went through development hell. :bigsmile:

[Zeromus_X]

Is it OK if I tell my allies to "Act In A Well Balanced Manner" and they run to the corner and do NOTHING!? I had fun killing Luther with Maria...

"Act in a Well-Balanced Manner" means that when either the character's HP or MP hits the danger zone, they'll back off and start acting defensively. If you set them to "Attack with All Your Might!" they'll attack and use cancel combos, etc. without regards to HP or MP.

However for some characters like Cliff, where their maximum MP is so ludicrously disproportionate to their maximum HP, they'll back off even if both their HP or MP is fully recovered. Usually this stops when you max out HP and MP on the Status Skill screen.

FYI, "Conserve Fury" means they won't use so much Fury and "Don't Use Coup de Graces!" means they won't activate any Battle Skills.

Yeah, it is annoying that Sophia/Peppita/Adray start off at their beginning levels, but it is realistic. Sophia was kidnapped for all that time, Peppita was with her troupe trying to get a job before they went to Moonbase, and Adray was on an investigation before the party left Elicoor. I don't see many opportunites for fighting experience in any of those scenarios. Besides, leveling up is easy in this game. :p

Maybe if I can make it through the long, boring cutscenes without falling asleep I'll get back to you on that. ;)

[Lawr]

However for some characters like Cliff, where their maximum MP is so ludicrously disproportionate to their maximum HP, they'll back off even if both their HP or MP is fully recovered. Usually this stops when you max out HP and MP on the Status Skill screen.

Yeah, thats basically what happens, but I don't think you'll need to cover your spoilers. (2003-2004 Game) =P

[Zeromus_X]

That's true, but just to be safe. :p

[LunarWeaver]

It's more that Sophia was standing right there. I mean, it's logical with her out of the party, but why take her out at all? All she had to do was climb into the same escape pod as Fayt and she could have been in the entire game. Same with Pepita. Same with Maria maybe landing 20 hours earlier than later. Although in the case of Maria, that probably would have ruined the excuse to have you stranded forever. Only tri-Ace would be like "Let's keep her out until the end lololol." Can you imagine FFIX having Garnet there yet not usable until you were on Disc 4? This is not the stuff a game should do to my organs.

Star Ocean does have good points, too. Like Fayt's hair is blue and he continues to run in place when you stop for a few seconds and it's funny. It also produced a lot of FaytxCliff yaoi for me to look at.

Oddly enough, I did not mind the "twist" at all. That was the main breaking point for so many, but my troubles were with the game's design and not the plot. I liked the twist, actually... >_>


Maybe if I can make it through the long, boring cutscenes without falling asleep I'll get back to you on that. ;)

Don't you even start rubbing my noggin on this business. Episode I has slightly less time than Final Fantasy X, so if you can play one you can play the other.