Let's Play Crystal Project: Obviously Crystals are more important than Adventure.

[Kalir]

Okay, so we're hitting a bit of what I might call the endgame slump of Crystal Project. Not that the game isn't fun here, mind you; I'm still having a blast. It's also very little exploration of new areas, the areas you are exploring are massive and featureless (i.e. the entire ocean) and there's no new classes to discover, only bone-crunching boss fights. Which is, again, still fun, but doesn't really make for efficient LP work, y'know? More time spent on my end with less to show for it.

Just a little warning for now. I'll still try to get weekly updates to the best of my ability, but expect them to be shorter.

I also have to contend with some bosses just not wanting to die when I fight them. I don't even think Pah is that hard compared to Ioske, I'm just not seeing the code for this one.

So exploring and boss fights are both time-consuming and low-reward. That leaves me with one ugly alternative.

Ugh... Quintar breeding.

I will be following a guide for this because I have done it at least twice now without a guide and I'm not inflicting that on myself anymore than I have to. Whether you're following a guide or not, this guy here at the west edge of Poko Poko Desert is virtually a requirement.

This at least indicates the first point at which actually spending money at the Quintar shop is worth doing. A Desert Quintar summoned via Ocarina is faster than a Flute-summoned one. Which means if you don't want to do any Quintar breeding, you can stop here.

Next up is this one hidden way up by Northern Stretch. This is, to my knowledge, the only place you can get a River Quintar.

I find it prudent at this stage to point out that this game was written well before "woke" became a pejorative of the conservatives.

Only one left to begin our horrible incestuous time-wasting adventure.

GOLB

Also this staff, which I take no great pride in saying I used once on a Chemist well into lategame. Again: fixed healing can be boosted.

Anyway, just take a nice look at my cash prior to starting this entire exercise. It's a comfy total borne of endgame adventuring. The vast majority of it will be sunk into Quintar breeding, even without the 12 gold upfront for the Quintar Ocarina.

Blah blah blah you can select a Quintar from the nursery to assign to the Ocarina.

Gonna hatch all three eggs, which is another... 10.50 gold. Great.

You are prompted to name each and every Quintar you hatch. Most of them will not see use save as links in a breeding chain. At least it is a place from which I can apply my hidden talent of giving disposable characters in video games the goofiest possible names.

So we have our first Quintar. This is the space I'm gonna use to talk in full detail about Quintar breeding.

First up is the Quintar's type. Already pretty well documented, this is what determines the properties the Quintar has beyond running and being bad at jumping. There are eight different types that I'll go over in roughly ascending order of rarity. Red and Blue Quintar are the standard issue and have no special qualities. Desert Quintar, as we've already experienced, are faster. River Quintar can run on water but not dive below. Highland Quintar are able to jump two blocks high like an unmounted person. Black Quintar can glide like owls. Aqua Quintar can dive and swim like Salmon. And, finally, Golden Quintar have all especial properties described above in a single banana-yellow package. The upshot of this is that your Quintar Ocarina, given the right mount, can replace almost all of your existing mount summon tools (except the Ibek Bell).

Next up is Nature. There's five natures, which are kinda sorta like genders, which determine how Quintar can breed. The only incompatibility is with same-nature Quintar, who simply replicate the "and so they were both bottoms" meme and don't get anything done. We'll go in the order we discovered them. Fiendish Quintar, when breeding, always produce offspring that's identical to them; same nature, same type. Which makes them utterly useless for our purposes (and explains the Quintar Enthusiast's disdain for their eyeballs, insofar as that can be explained). Brutish Quintar will always pass on their type to their offspring but never their nature, so Skuptus here will only have Desert children but their natures can be anything. (Technically, if you breed Brutish and Fiendish, the type is inherited from the Brutish, but don't do that it's pointless). Fancy Quintar can ONLY be obtained by breeding, never found in the wild (again, somewhat explaining the Quintar Enthusiast's actions) and have the capacity for mutations that result in a completely different type from either parent. Trusty Quintar, conversely, can only be found in the wild, never obtained via breeding. And finally, Woke is a fifth one to round out the selection, resulting in most breeding being a dance between Brutish, Woke, and Fancy natures until such time as you get the mutations needed to reach Golden. Clear as mud, right?

Finally, there's Status, and while the other two properties are nice and straightforward, Status is anything but. In order for Quintar to mate, they have to both be Happy! which means managing the food they're eating and their racing. I have NO EARTHLY IDEA how this stat is calculated, and to my best observations there are three hidden stats that correspond to the total here, those being Hunger, Mood, and Stamina. In order to be Happy! a Quintar must not be hungry at all, have enough stamina for mating, and be in a good enough mood. The main way you influence this is with the various food items sold at the shop, but if there is a method to the madness therein, I have yet to glean it despite, again, having done this at least twice. Usually I just pad it out with cheese and berries, then do extra races to burn off the calories, but after a point you have to just go away for a bit and let the Quintar resettle, in my experience. If there is a better way to do it PLEASE LET ME KNOW THIS IS TEDIOUS.

Anyway, to get things started here we need four Quintar. We've got a Desert and our Trusty Blue here.

And a Woke River one.

You can always see the outcome of any potential mating before committing to the bit which is nice. But even if we get both Quintar involved to be Happy! there's one... one last step.

Oh yeah this duck can tell you what your type does.

The last step... is QUINTAR RACING.

In isolation, a Quintar race isn't usually too bad. On each course you'll have three other racers to deal with, including one star racer that usually pulls ahead of the pack early on. Northern Stretch is a relatively inoffensive course, and the contenders are all pretty standard fare with the star racer being a River Quintar that can't leverage their unique trait. The main issue is that if you mess up, it's VERY easy to lose ground to a point of no return. Again, Northern Stretch isn't too bad, the spikes are pretty avoidable and don't set you back very far, and there are plenty of routes that favor a more technical racer and let them cut ahead of the pack. Northern Stretch is also a very low-risk race, since the entry fee is a scant 10 silver and the winnings are five times the entry no matter the race. This makes Northern Stretch an ideal place to learn the ropes, and not half bad later on for the hidden, ugly curse of Quintar breeding.

It's not enough that Quintar have a needlessly complex system of diet, natures, and types you have to dance through to breed a Golden Quintar. No, they're also prideful! Some Quintar won't agree to mate with others unless they have enough wins on different courses under their belt! This requirement gets steeper the rarer the type of the Quintar in question.

And some of these courses are absolute bastardry!

Eastern Chasm starts introducing the "fun" of points where if you miss a jump, it may as well count as an elimination. Prize money and bragging rights are winner-takes-all, after all. The first part isn't too bad unless you luck into the exact spot needed to land on the route to Undergrowth, but woe unto the racer who misses a jump on the bridges. The ones that go over the earlier parts of the course are tough but at least that's a quick enough fall to register what's going on. It's the ones that cut over the Open Sea that are really rude. Remember, if you fall from there, you're not getting back until you wait a full eight or so seconds of airtime to hit the water, which in a race is tantamount to disqualification. Eastern Chasm does have one upside to it, and that's that it's the first course where you can mess with the opposition to any degree. In the first part, not only is it possible to get the other racers stuck on terrain, if you bodyblock one of them as they jump over spikes, they stay in the spike pit. NPCs don't follow respawn rules of spikes/water/lava/etc. after all! This can permanently eliminate one or more racers from the current run, letting you complete it at your leisure.

EAT THE FOOD TINA.

At least this course is pretty reasonable.

See, one might assume that the Chalice of Tar, as it is with multiple precarious points where you can fall off bridges and the like, is one of the harder courses. Not so, really, even factoring in that the star racer is a Desert Quintar. See, unlike most other courses, the Chalice of Tar has a massive shortcut. Simply double around the corner right as you reach the central basin, and traverse the shoreline. You can climb up even with the base Quintar jump to circumvent the entire second half of the race with more than enough time to beat even a Desert Quintar. This makes Chalice of Tar the easiest race for most types of Quintar, and the returns on your entry fee start to even earn you full gold pieces. Slow going compared to, y'know, the cost of racing and breeding in the first place, but it stems the bleeding.

Anyway, after several races, we finally get our first egg. How many races, you ask? Well, first we have to unlock enough courses to appease these jerks. River Quintar like Houhy won't deign to mate with anyone with fewer than two wins under their metaphorical belt. Desert and Highland Quintar are similarly needy. Meanwhile, Black Quintar require 3 wins on their partner, and Aqua Quintar ask for 4. Technically Golden Quintar won't mate with anyone unless they've one all five courses, but if you're trying to get your Golden Quintar to mate with someone... quit it.

So that's a minimum of two races here, assuming we did both with Beeum and unlocked courses specifically with them. But I wanted to make things a bit easier, so I ran Northern Stretch with Skuptus to ensure a bit of choice. Kinda pointless, but boy did we did it. Racing is also a useful way to whet Quintar appetites and improve their mood at the cost of some stamina, so you'll probably be doing even more races than the prescribed amount per breeding.

All of this costs money for food, incubators, and race entry, and the winnings don't come close to making up the difference, to say nothing of the sheer amount of time one must sink into the practice.

Time to get our fourth wild Quintar! Located in this virtually-imperceptible cove in the northeast part of the Quintar Reserve...

HNUUUUUUGHH.

Red Woke! This cuts... what, maybe two or three breedings out of the overall chain?

Whatever, I'm taking it.

Let's get this win over with while we're here.

This course is brutal. First of all, it's the only course you can't explore outside of a race, which means no unique map: get a Deep Sea map or go away. Second, remember how Eastern Chasm let you scam other Quintar out of the race because of spikes not respawning NPCs? Yeah that works against you here, hard. This route is an enclosed corridor whose main obstacle is tight squeezes and loads of spikes, the latter of which do not impede the other Quintar in the least. No getting to use shortcuts to your benefit here, you just have to run the course faster, better, and more carefully than everyone else. Most people hold that Undersea Trail is the hardest course in the set, and I can't really find a lot of fault with that.

Some may argue that the final course is the hardest of all, and I can certainly agree with that on the face of it. But I'll be damned if I race the last course fair and square, this garbage takes enough time as it is.

It's time to get a unique Quintar out of all this.

Note that while I didn't HAVE to win any races for this pair, this was the fastest way I could think of to regulate their status into Happy! for both of them. Which meant another... three or so races. Bleugh.

Oh well, we have a Highland Quintar now. Now we have Infinite Money Engine forever.

See, you might not have realized it, but the Quintar race courses by and large only work because the Quintar only have a single tile of jump height. Some courses can be broken right the hell open because of the Highland Quintar's two-tile height. And lucky us, the best race to abuse this on is also the most lucrative.

Some might call me dishonest for showing off the final course with this shortcut. Do it. If you're so curious about running this course legit, do it on your own time. Quintar Reserve is like the Eastern Chasm but without the early grace period. There are countless places most Quintar will get endlessly stuck, and the sole indicator you have for your path is the dirt trail which might not even indicate your route safely. You have to jump atop trees with precision and missing will cost you the race. And unlike Eastern Chasm, there's no spikes, which means while you CAN boot the other Quintar down with proper bodyblocking to eliminate them, they can just as easily do the same to you. That said, Quintar Reserve is easily cheesed out by a Highland Quintar, who laughs in the face of the Quintar's Lament jump. And with the highest payout for a win, there's nothing stopping a player from entering a Highland Quintar into this course and getting 2 gold for a meager... 30 seconds of their time. As much as they want. You want infinite money at high speed? This is one of the better avenues for it.

Right, that's all the Quintar racing you're getting out of me. I'm gonna offscreen the rest and get on to some actual exploration.

Is this the greatest enemy sprite in the game? It might be. Anyway, Shank Sharks have Snipe, Barrage, and Overload. Guess what their gameplan is. They're also pretty dang resistant to physical attacks.

Ooooh getting close to 60! Once we hit level cap I can REALLY start going to town on end/postgame stuff.

Plus, we got a Gold Staff out of that bit we found by the wrecked ship! Good!

Means I can mark where Coyote is since we've explored there before. Just off the coast of Beaurior Volcano, as luck would have it. Easily reached!

Hm... kind of inconvenient timing, but at least I can work through my class backlog a bit more.

No one else is gonna use this class. May as well.

We're close to the second usage for these things I promise.

Anyway, let's do some Deep Sea mapping. Fortunately, the map takes into account what you've seen from the Open Sea already.

Anywhere the map cuts off into that pure blue is Depths territory and outside our paygrade for the time being. Give it like... one or two more updates.

Besides, the Deep Sea has so much stuff in it I discovered entirely new things just this update! Wow! stay tuned! like and subscribe!

Hehe pinnacle crab.

Lots of crabs in this region!

Well, anyway.

Coyote isn't a very deadly foe on their own: Impale, Jet Pulse, and Atmoshear is their entire moveset. Their gameplan is simple: force you to mistarget with Confusion, either when healing your teammates of their single target attacks, or when targeting them to proc the counter from Mind's Delusion. This auxiliary target does nothing but Insult your team, but responds to any incoming damage with Death, a spell that does exactly what it says on the label. This is a pretty devious setup, but I rather like it because as deadly as it is, you're provided with more than a few ways to answer it. Like Guaba, anyone that can avoid proccing counters (namely Samurai, Rogues, and anyone wielding a fitting katana) can go to town on Coyote without fear of reprisal. GUTS is demonstrating this even with a fresh Fencer class equipped with Samurai's Unreactable. While spells don't cut it like they did with Guaba, magicalists aren't out of options either. Consistent status clearing can wipe Confusion and keep you on target, and your Summoner can open up a free turn of whoopass with the help of Niltsi. And, of course, killing the Mind's Delusion, hard though it is, takes it out of the fight for good, leaving only Coyote as an unimpressive single foe. In the event you defeat Coyote first instead, Mind's Delusion will Escape at the first opportunity. Just uh... don't use Explode like I did. Mind's Delusion will still counter it with Death, but they'll choose a new target since their first choice will already be down.

Next up, the Quizard village. Forgive the state of my map, the holes in my Tall, Tall Heights/Overpass/Northern Stretch mapping are showing the Deep Sea underneath and it just looks tacky.

Anyway, eight Quizards down here pose us a question. I'll show the correct answer for each one, but if you've been paying attention, they shouldn't be too hard to figure out anyway.

Just went over the rationale behind this, so that's nice.

Been using Summoner? Good. Not been using Summoner? Uh-oh.

It's a simple 4x4 grid.

For people who haven't found it yet, this could be a clue! "Wait, there's a Crystal in Capital Sequoia?!"

Pretty easy one here.

And that does it. The lock pops open as soon as we get anywhere near it.

This leads to a VERY valuable item indeed. The Treasure Finder will always reveal chests on your minimap you haven't found yet, which can make for some much easier searching of the Deep Sea.

Oh yeah here's the Undersea Trail. Right by the other Quintar racing courses. Convenient map, no?

Near as I can tell, the entire tunnel is airtight. No way in from outside.

There's a couple isolated salmon swimming around, but most of them just comment on your steed. This one, though...

I know it's dangerous, but I'm lonely.

This one warns us, albeit indirectly, of a major threat lurking in the Depths.

And as soon as it tells us this, it swims down there, never to be seen again.

Again, the Depths are gonna have to wait, but we'll probably start our excursions here.

Crabs and treasure to collect, you understand.

Speaking of treasure, we get our first hit with the Treasure Finder! This is a little northeast of the Quintar Reserve.

This one's a little tricky. See that outcropping next to us? It's actually a passage to a hidden cavern, guarded by a high-level foe.

Those foes waste no time in attacking passersby, ambushing them before they can figure out the secret!

Flesh Eaters are fast and strong, combining Reaping, a self-buff of Crazed, and a nasty moveset of Fury Swipes, Blood Spiller, Blood Extract and Harden into a single package. They can tear apart an unprepared team before they can react.

I'm very prepared. It's fine, Werdna's got the highest XP anyway.

In addition to the Deep Sea Scrap, we pilfer the Forgotten Key used in the ruins offshore of Jidamba Tangle! Neato!

Speaking of Jidamba Tangle, there's still a few treasures here we've missed. Largely they're just yellow chests, so I'm not hugely upset by this.

There is, however, some great armor for a heavy armor using caster. The Demon Helm provides, on top of its decent defenses, some Spell Lifesteal, highly welcome for a Reaper that's playing the class right and using a magic subcommand.

Ditto for the matching Demon Plate found on the foliage level.

Speaking of Reapers, the Soul Keeper is an unusual but strong sword that grants Mind, Spirit, and even some MP absorb on physical attacks... at the expense of a hefty -100 max MP. Again, hybrid combatants, particularly physical fighters making use of Mixed Magic, are the ideal recipients.

Hey thanks.

A little north of the Jidamba-side Capital Pipeline, there's another hidden spot!

This one's a bit more of a secret maze.

Even without the Treasure Finder, the terrain hereabouts may give you a clue as to its existence.

The tricky part is that the entrance to the best treasure here is... opaque, let's say.

Right here!

How'd you get all the way down here? Well, let's put this to use, eh?

I also find this ruined shrine sunk off the east coast of the Quintar Reserve.

It's Fire resistant in particular and regular Resistance resistant to a degree! Unfortunately, whatever stone this shrine may have housed, it's long gone.

How did I forget this? Baaaaaah!

This Treasure Finder is great but also it can make you very frustrated with yourself if you find treasures left wide in the open you've passed up before. Don't take it personal if this happens in Shoudu Province and you haven't done any Sky Arena, by the way.

Lemme in loser.

Oh! That'll be handy for later!

But for now, this cool axe is all we really need.

It's a pretty cool axe.

Got this fancy number when we flew from Callisto Shrine over to Delende and dived into the heart-shaped lake. Comes with a pretty solid Luck boost if you're in the mood to fish for Checkmate supercrits.

Oh I am REALLY running out of ideas for Meena. Ah well, not like this is a BAD move.

Let's clean up the last bit of what we can in Jidamba Tangle. If there are more gold veins here, I haven't found them.

I told you about Shoudu Province with the Treasure Finder I TOLD YOU

The tricky trick here is that you can see the entryway from the inn room. Anyway, Looter's Pin! It's a Luck and drop rate boost! We've got better things on both ends now but we have it and it's ours.

Anyway, the Sequoia. We're not gonna enter it, but we ARE putting it on the map. It IS eastish of Quintar Reserve, but also a little north, and there's nowhere for an owl to land. Swimming in is the only way to enter it.

That box will not be available for a long long long long time. But I want it. I can see it and I want it.

I continue mapping things out for a bit when suddenly OCTOPUS?

I've never seen this before! What is this? It's too fast for us and quickly escapes.

I note it for later and FINALLY find the thing I was hoping to find in my mapping the entire damn time I've been out at sea.

This final shrine is the last one we need, and warps us to... I believe this is southeast off the coast of Jidamba Tangle? Not exactly a convenient location for most purposes, but for exploring the Depths or the Sequoia, it's well worth it.

Anyway, the trick with the Speedy Octopus is that, by moving northeast-ish in this ONE SPECIFIC SPOT around the west side of the Sequoia, it will spawn in and run the other way. Intercept it to receive...

The Pointy Hat. It is... a hard to use item, given that it has a lot of penalties to enable its frankly terrifying boost of +1 debuff ticks. Like, if it wasn't for the MP magnification, that could make for a terrifying Summoner that gets a free extra turn of whatever their Summon does.

Closing the update out with some more Quintar breeding for the hell of it.

Note that because of how the nursery only has the eight slots to it, you're going to have to regularly release Quintar to make room for more. Destroying the evidence, let's call it. Completionists need not fear, there are exactly enough slots for all eight Quintar types.

This is where our Aqua Quintar comes from, and where my update ends because I can only tolerate so much Quintar breeding at once.

I don't even know how many races I did to try to manage these persnickety dips. And this isn't even the halfway point. We still need a Black Quintar and then we need to further breed either the Black or Aqua to a Fancy.

The rarer ones have a more pronounced crest. Be impressed by this.

This Quintar is the same as a salmon except it can run on land. Wow!

I need some catharsis. One moment, before we close it out for today.

Do you know that your palace is run by a slaughterer who considers your body parts to be trophies?

If you say so.

There's only one more thing we can get from the Quintar Enthusiast for showing him eyeballs.

THIS EYEBALL IS FROM A PROTECTED SPECIMEN!

And that is a frankly baffling mental pathway and a hidden boss fight!

Unfortunately, I don't quite pull it off, but yeah! This is what happens if you show him a never-before-seen eyeball! He calls you a poacher and tries to kill you. Quintar fans, I swear.

Far more achievable right now is this fight. But I wanted to beat the Quintar Enthusiast...

Effectively, the Ramparts Demon isn't too different from the Crag Demon. More of a focus on Burn with stuff like Fireblast and Spit Fire, less on physical lockdown as their only physical attacks are Feeding Frenzy and Bone Crunch. Still opens the fight with Fire Breath, of course. You won't likely stand a chance until you're near the level cap, but once you get there the fight is fundamental for sure. Given that their only multitarget move is Fire Breath, as long as your tank can handle the pressure you should really have no trouble whatsoever. Special mention to Valkyrie's Steel Heart stance shutting down the main form of focus fire the Ramparts Demon has, i.e. damage over time.

Cool sword though.

Have I mentioned that Quintar breeding takes a lot of time? Still not done yet! Next update, hopefully!

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
  • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
• Explore Beaurior Volcano.
  • Explore Beaurior Rock.
    • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
    • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
  • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
  • Find the Valkyrie class.
• Explore the Open Sea.
  • Explore the Sequoia.
  • Explore the Deep Sea.
    • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
    • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
    • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
    • Explore Neptune Shrine.
      • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
    • Explore the Depths.
      • Find the Cerulean Book.
• Explore the Chalice of Tar.
  • Find the Vermillion Book.
  • Find the White Crystal.
  • Find the Mimic class.
• Explore Jidamba Tangle.
  • Obtain the Europa Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
  • Find the Foliage Key.
  • Find the Canopy Key.
  • Find the Cave Key.
  • Defeat Rexosaur.
  • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
    • Find the Viridian Book.
    • Find the Orchid Crystal.
    • Find the Weaver class.
    • Find the Salmon Violin.

 

[Mogri]

As long as you're offscreening it, you know there's an option to completely bypass the races, right?

 

[Kalir]

I know, but the races themselves aren't really the bottleneck for me, weirdly enough. It's managing food/enthusiasm whatever levels that bugs me. At this point the races fly by, since I'm practiced enough at them.

 

[Destil]

I did 0 races and I have 0 regrets about it.

 

[Kalir]

Let's waste no time whatsoever here. This is probably the last "intermission" post, and in it we'll be tackling all the odds and ends not directly related to content I want to be at level cap for.

As already discussed, Masashi's not a very tricky foe, just one with a lot of physical damage output, both area and single-target. Lots of ways you can handle this, but the best way is to combine the Steeling Wind move of the Valhalla set with Power Down debuffs of any source. You also want to spec your team such that they can survive an opening Cleave, as he will almost always open with one. And, of course, the usual methods of stuffing physical moves (Tira, Eye Gouge, Utsusemi) are as viable as ever. That's really about it. Cleave will do lots of damage to your party, and his Jikiden combo can usually drop a tank unless they're perfectly set up to counter it. The biggest hurdle is his selection of stats, he's very fast and very strong.

Anyway, a lot of my time here will be offscreen Deep Sea exploration and Quintar racing/breeding. Don't worry about it. In between racing/diving, I also go cleaning up my map elsewhere. Secret treasure, you say?

Secret treasure!

The Undead Ring provides a slightly less extreme benefit than the Slimy Coat, with 35% physical damage dealt and taken in your favor. It also only takes an accessory slot rather than armor, making it much easier to fold into the gameplan without sacrificing valuable stats for an effect that goes away when you die. Only catch is that healing effects by default do not work on the undead and instead cause damage... but lifedrain and regen work normally! Jimmy and the Pulsating Mass strategeries return!

Anyway, this is one half of the necessary recipe for our fun Golden Quintar right here. I feel like the name here really captures my emotional state at the time of this recording.

Our next step here is to procure a Black Quintar, the first step of which is getting a Desert Quintar that isn't Brutish. Which, I believe, means Skuptus has outlived their usefulness. With only eight slots in the nursery, you kind of have to be quick to release the others to the wild. It's for the best anyway, I'm a terrible caretaker as are all Quintar fans.

I won't bore you with the exact combinations here, not when you can just look up the Steam guide I'm using for the exact process. Here, I'll even link it for you. Aren't I nice?

Black Quintar replace their usual jump with the same glide effect of the owl, but stapled onto a Quintar's land speed and mediocre jump height. As such, it's not a STRAIGHT upgrade that replaces the Owl Drum, but it is nice.

We are now one hour into the first of my two recording sessions and only a smattering of races away from being done with this entire fiasco.

Just gotta grind up some gold for one last incubator...

Pronounce it out loud to get the general idea of how I felt about things. I always name my Golden Quintar this for some reason!

What a special quintar!

You say that now, but in a few years when they develop acute cellular aquefaction from all the inbreeding then what?! Do you think Super Mario Sunshine was not a cautionary tale?!

Anyway yeah. A Golden Quintar, called via the Ocarina, obsoletes every other mount summon tool except the Ibek Bell (and there is at least one mod that gives it a jump height of 3 just for kicks so it even obsoletes that). While it is not required to explore the Sequoia, it does make exploring the Sequoia a lot less frustrating.

What you actually do need a Golden Quintar for, no substitutes, is a hidden location in the Underpass, connected to the Soiled Den. Hidden along the route to the Ancient Reservoir...

Is the Jade Cavern, home to an especially valuable secret.

Tread lightly here, the only enemies you can find in the water are vicious. Impalers start out Crazed, apply Bleed with every physical hit they land, and have Jet Pulse and Impale. Water-resistant but Thunder-weak.

I've already gone over every class ability right now, but I want to highlight this one. You will see its true power later this update.

Anyway, to enter the structure within the Jade Cavern, you have to go to an elevated point (I prefer the west entrance leading from Ancient Reservoir) and glide over. Golden Quintar makes this easier, but a salmon/owl combo can do it too.

Yup, right here!

Once inside, the layout is pretty similar to the ninja yashiki of Okimoto N.S., right down to the layered staircases "hidden" from view.

You have clues of course.

Like so.

Most of the structure is obscured by cave-ins, making traversal difficult and plunder unprofitable.

Map is pretty easy to find at least.

THIS is what you need a Golden Quintar for, with no substitutions. An owl or even a Black Quintar won't be fast enough, and no mount incapable of gliding can even try it.

But a Golden Quintar can. What's the benefit, though?

This guy, right here. The Quizard is the other purpose of the class seals I've hinted at for oh-so-long, and why I'm spending my endgame making a point of mastering everything rather than sticking to an idealized build for this party.

Sure, they're not cheap, but the armors sold here are not only very endgame-viable, they can also open up some goofity-ass abilities for your team. Unfortunately, the power balance here is kind of skewed, with some merely being "nice" and others being "crack the game over your knee". I'll sprinkle the endgame armor stats and my thoughts on them riiiiight here for now (in the order we acquired the classes). Oh, and every single armor also changes the appearance of the wearer to match the indicated class, just for funsies.

Spoiler: Mastery Armors

Warrior Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +190
Resistance: +40
+50% Threat generated.

Yeah, that's a super basic tanking armor. The low Resistance here, lower than any other mastery armor, really hurts this one in my book, and while the increased Threat gain is certainly nice... any self-respecting Warrior shouldn't have any trouble whatsoever maintaining top Threat at all times. Kinda underwhelming, really.

Monk Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +160
Resistance: +75
+30 Strength while unarmed.

The value of the Monk Vest depends entirely on whether you've been building a character for Brawler. If you have, this makes them an incomparably fearsome striker that does boatloads of damage. If not... I mean, it's fine? You'll probably have a better medium armor option that doesn't require 25 gold and a Monk mastery, but it's there.

Rogue Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +110
Resistance: +90
Attack: +30
Speed: +20

It's armor that provides Speed. Speed on equipment is incredibly rare, as you well know. It's not flashy, but the Rogue Vest is a solid bit of kit and no mistake. And lots of classes that favor medium armor (Rogue, Ninja and Beatsmith come to mind) have plenty of Speed and certainly won't complain about more, even if the stat does run into some diminishing returns after a bit.

Wizard Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +30
Resistance: +180
Mind: +60
Self-applies Magic Up (+35% magical damage dealt) buff at the start of combat for 3 turns.

Magic striker armor, hell yes. Second lowest Defense of all the mastery armors, but I think you and I can both agree the raw power afforded by both the Mind boost and the self-buff more than make up for it. Besides, a Wizard has Mind Stance to make up the difference anyway, right? And what self-respecting endgame magic blaster ISN'T running Black Magic at least part-time? Definitely a powerful option.

Cleric Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +60
Resistance: +190
Spirit: +60
+35% healing given.

It's a cute parallel to the Wizard Robe, but if you ask me, while it's certainly not BAD on a Cleric, the Cleric Robe is actually much stronger on classes that struggle with weaker base healing values, like Warlock or Chemist. This amplifies their abilities that trade potency for speed, allowing you to have the best of both worlds. It's good for any healer, really, but I think the value works better on lightweight healers than more dedicated ones. It's also tied with highest Defense on the mastery armors, alongside the Shaman Robe.

Warlock Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +170
Resistance: +80
Max MP: -10%
Doublecast may be cast any number of times per turn.

Best Resistance of the heavy mastery armors. Oh, and also you can Doublecast infinitely. This really shouldn't be used on anyone except a Warlock or a Mimic for obvious reasons: you REALLY need Chaincaster discounting the cost to make this worth the max MP penalty. But being able to take as many Mixed Magic actions in a turn as your weakened MP can support is, obviously, really really strong. I don't personally think it's the most broken armor in the set, but I can't deny the power of that action economy.

Fencer Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +150
Resistance: +110
Allows you to equip Rapiers regardless of class proficiencies.
Self-applies Duel Ready (Guarantees a crit on the next attack) buff for 2 physical attacks at the start of combat.

Just like Fencer as a class, the Fencer Vest is convenient. I can't really give it higher praise than that, it's just convenient. Solid Defense and Resistance, free Rapier proficiency in case you don't feel like spending one whole PP on Equip Rapier, and two free crits to start the fight off. None of that is really "I need this in my life" so much as it is "oh hey, that's helpful". And that's fine and okay.

Scholar Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +50
Resistance: +190
Mind: +50
Spirit: +50
Allows you to equip Medium Headgear and Heavy Helmets regardless of class proficiencies.

This one's pretty unique! The hybrid caster angle is entirely expected for the Scholar Robe and welcome to many classes, but also affording total flexibility with headwear is a benefit not seen anywhere else in the game (outside of Equip All but haha yeah). This allows you to get much more flexible with defensive stats and auxiliary options, even if your average light armor using class isn't especially hungry for different headwear. Just having the option is cool!

Shaman Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +60
Resistance: +160
Mind: +60
Spirit: +60
+25% spell lifesteal.

Another "damn this is solid fundamentals" bit of kit. Free lifesteal and a boost to both Mind and Spirit is a package few casters would turn down, and the high Defense for a light armor isn't anything to sneeze at either. Not really a lot to say here. A caster that just wants to be better at both power and survivability will happily take the Shaman Robe.

Aegis Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +180
Resistance: +50
Gaining AP also restores 1% of max HP for every point of AP.

Reactive healing let's go baby love da mets. As with Dervish's Aura effect, for best results the Aegis Mail should be put to use with an AP-consuming moveset (i.e. not Chivalry) so that you can continually leave room for the healing to trip. So while a normal Aegis CAN use this, it might be better-suited to a class like Warrior or Samurai, who tanks for their team by providing huge amounts of Threat.

Hunter Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +130
Resistance: +95
Accuracy: +30
-25% Threat generated.

As with the Aegis Mail, the Hunter Mail is certainly appreciated on its matching class, but its more appreciated on Rogue specifically for the lower Threat generation. Oh, and the Accuracy boost is obviously meant to synergize with using bows, but it's not like only bow users have accuracy issues. Lots of uses here, even if most classes will prefer a different armor.

Chemist Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +50
Resistance: +200
Spirit: +50
Abilities consume half the items needed, rounded up.

THATS RIGHT WE HAVE THE RARE CHEMIST WITH NINJUTSU DREAM TEAM GEAR LET'S GOOOO. I mean. Chemist Robe is a fine idea if you're running extended lengths of boss fights, and it drastically improves how many shots of Fenix Syrup you can use midfight, that's reason enough to want it. But outside of that? I really don't see item stores being a risk by the time you're far enough in the game to get this. At least the Resistance is high.

Reaper Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +160
Resistance: +60
Self-applies Power Up (+35% physical damage dealt) buff at the start of combat for 3 turns.

The physical striker answer to the Wizard Robe... almost. The defensive values are slightly different, and this armor doesn't provide any damage boost outside of the initial buff, unlike the Mind boost from Wizard Robe. I doubt that'll be enough of a change to dissuade people from using this if they're in a position to do so, and plenty of heavy armor wearers are physical damage beasts, so like... yeah it's nice.

Nomad Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +90
Resistance: +90
Attack: +30
Mind: +30
+30 AP at the start of combat.

OOOOOOOHHH now we're talking. Sure, the defensive values here are weak. Who cares. You're starting with maxed AP! And it comes with both Attack and Mind! This one's hard to use given that it's medium armor, and it's hard to find a class outside of Nomad who'd want it AND could equip it. If it was heavy armor, Samurai would be all over this. Unfortunately, Samurai is used to the crippling disappointment of incompatibility issues. Nomad obviously loves it, but y'know who else does? Beatsmith.

Ninja Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +150
Resistance: +100
Evasion: +20
Self-applies Disappear (Dodge all physical attacks) buff when critically injured for 1 turn or physical attack taken.

Actually one of the best defensive armors in the game. The Evasion boost is whatever, but the core stats are solid, and the built in panic dodge of Disappear allows you a lot of leeway to get in there with pinch healing when your tank takes a heavy blow. Honestly worth the effort of suffering through mastering a Ninja.

Dervish Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +55
Resistance: +190
Mind: +40
Spirit: +40
+6 AP after using magic.

I... don't entirely know how best to use this. Like, for accelerating the user's AP gain it's great and all... but as with the Nomad Vest before it, the class that most readily comes to mind for spending AP is Samurai, which can't equip this. A Dervish CAN use it for weird accelerated MP gain and support of an AP using subcommand, but that feels weird and janky to me. And if you're just in it for the stats... Scholar Robe or Shaman Robe are right there, just use those. Someone who's good at theorycrafting help me with this.

Beatsmith Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +170
Resistance: +110
Begin battle ready to act immediately.

Really good defensive stats stapled to a thing that feels weak at first but is actually very situationally strong. A good chunk of lategame threats are fast enough to act before you, and remember kids, "act immediately" effects also nullify all CT on your first action as well! Sure, Beatsmith isn't gonna use this, but a Dervish? Now we're talking. This may be the only piece of kit they need to ensure they can wipe every non-boss encounter with Typhoon or Rockslide on sight.

Samurai Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +175
Resistance: +50
Max AP: +30

Hey remember how I said the chief issue with Jikiden is the AP cap preventing it from being used on anything except a mainclass Samurai (or technically a Mimic)? Well... what if that wasn't the case? What if you had a Valkyrie doing all the usual team tankhealing stuff except they can pull an entire Samurai burst turn out of nowhere whenever they feel like it? What if that? And that's just the first thing I thought of. Could also use this to fuel an AP battery for Waterbend's Armors, for example.

Valkyrie Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +190
Resistance: +60
Self-applies Regen (+15% healing per turn) at the start of combat.

Now this is some fundamentals. Just good defensive stats coupled with innate durationless Regen. You want the power armor that alives you? It's right here. Take take take. Take. Oh, the regen does go away if the tank bites the dust, no matter what Reraise has to say on the matter. But if you have these stats and free constant regen, who says you have to die?

Assassin Vest
Medium Armor
Defense: +150
Resistance: +100
+20 crit damage.
On hit, 5% chance to inflict Instant Kill on the target.

Weirdly, the big value here isn't the instakill, it's the crit damage. Like yeah, a secret chance to instantly kill any non-boss enemy is nice, but it's not like Assassins have needed help with that (although it can be a huge boon in boss fights built around summoning help). Most bonuses to crit damage are percentage modifiers, though. This one's a flat +20 to that number, which then also takes all the percentile modifiers you already have and staples them on. Sounds nice, yeah?

Beastmaster Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +200
Resistance: +50
Luck: +50
+10% Threat generated.

Warrior Mail except good. Better defensive stats and a free Luck bonus, and we do like Luck bonuses on our Beastmasters, don't we? The Threat gain is pretty minimal but rather consistent with most heavy armors built for tanking anyway. Kind of weird that nothing here combos with Beastmaster's heavy CT, but eh, it's fine, this is fine.

Summoner Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +20
Resistance: +80
Mind: +60
Spirit: +60
-25% CT.

Please, I am begging you, do not let the CT shaving here get to your head. Yes, it's CT shaving on an armor slot and that never happens and any amount of CT shaving is really really good. The more relevant number is the defensive stats, or lack thereof. This absolutely does not survive the wrath of any lategame enemy that dares to direct it towards the wearer. Casters already tend to take critical damage from a single physical hit lategame, this basically ensures their death.

Weaver Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +50
Resistance: +200
Mind: +50
-50 TT at the start of combat.
Physical attacks never miss.

Oh this is a weird one. Ensuring perfect accuracy on physical attacks is very fun for a hybrid physical attacker, but how many of those want to wear, or even can wear, light armor? There is one, as it happens, one we've been making strong use of for the whole game, and that's Nomad. This armor, despite being associated with Weaver, is tailormade for Nomads. The TT jump early on lets them snap into their stance of choice immediately, and a Nomad doesn't usually have the stat room to overinvest in Agility, leading to ugly miss issues.

Mimic Mail
Heavy Armor
Defense: +200
Resistance: +50
+10% physical and magical damage dealt.
+10% healing given.

And finally... hyper-generalist armor that makes the wearer just better at everything. It's... fine, really. It's another armor that's a perfectly reasonable option for a lot of characters (Warlock comes to mind) and is hard to turn away even if you're not perfectly kitted for it.

HEY JERKASS, REMATCH TIME.

This fight is less against the Quintar Enthusiast and more against his prize specimen, a Trusty Highland named Buttermint. The Quintar Enthusiast does nothing but buff and heal support for Buttermint and has a much lower health total, making focusing them down pivotal to win. Buttermint, meanwhile, is a single-target damage fiend, with Pecking Flurry and Aero both backed by absurd stats as their preferred weapons, not to mention Build Life to restore the Quintar Enthusiast to life. Sun Bath is effectively a passed turn from them, thankfully; the heal value is much lower than the Quintar Enthusiast's Remedy. Surviving Buttermint's damage output is one thing, especially with their speed and Variance, but what's really important is keeping the Quintar Enthusiast down at all times. The longer the Quintar Enthusiast is up, the more buffs they can throw to Buttermint, and Buttermint has to take a turn to revive the Quintar Enthusiast, which is a turn they're not dogpiling you with heavy damage. Buff canceling from Warlock or Beastmaster can also come in handy, to undo the Quintar Enthusiast's support work once they're out of play. Answering them with debuffs is also an option, but you'll, again, want to first drop the Quintar Enthusiast before you go ham on those given Remedy.

The prize of the Lockon Lense is... kind of unimpressive, but hey! This one's more of a bragging rights fight anyway. And also catharsis for putting up with the tomfollery of the Quintar Enthusiast earlier.

Back to ocean exploration! Wave Hunters have Feeding Frenzy (Bleed, Weakness, some variance, there are so many moves in the game and I forget which ones I've shared with everyone), Critical Turn, and no other stats worth mentioning.

This fight gives Werdna the Learning passive! Woooooooo! Done with Scholar! On to the next fiasco...

Assassin time. Nobody in our party has the right blend of stats to really make this class work, Werdna's just the least worst choice.

The rare swimming Medusa has Adrenaline, Drown, Stun Lock and Nullification. Guess what her gameplan is.

Not really a lot to cover with the Deep Sea at this point, but my mapping and looting of occasional inconsequential treasure continues apace nonetheless.

Hey, here's something! South of Sara Sara Bazaar is a charming little coral reef, where Wayfarer Joe has stationed a raft for fishing purposes. We will, of course, avail ourselves of his services.

As always, there's a handy amount of things to get here. The Fairy's Ring is an exemplary pick for tankhealers, especially Valkyrie. Had I the slightest bit of sense I'd equip this to Meena and never look back, but she does need that Nomad Seal right now...

You can also get some diamond here. Most other sources of diamond are in the Depths, where you can discover it in abundance, but again, the Depths can wait for next time.

Red mage's rapier. It's nice yeah sure.

This one's kind of weak at this stage though. Confusion resistance can be sort of handy for Coyote (fought just southeast of here)? But eh.

What's that? More gear just for Nomads? I love it! Thanks!

Oh, and we also get boatloads of Fresh Salmon from this. Y'know, in between attempts at cohesive treasure.

This is the final one. This heavy armor only has 50 Defense and no Resistance, but it comes with a frankly unreasonable boost of 500 max HP. Put this on a tank with adequate healing support and you won't even notice the lower defense.

Anyway, moving right along. We're gonna see about finding some last few Gold Ingots for upgrades, and if memory serves there's some to be found around the Ancient Labyrinth here.

No! I don't need Diamond!!! I know where I can get more Diamond than I will ever use!!!!! (I have already pulled up the Fandom page for Gold Ingot for locations. Yes I know it's Fandom. Crystal Project is a very indie game what do you want from me.)

Eventually I climb to the very top of the Ancient Labyrinth. It is just as inscrutable up here.

BEHOLD THE CUBE.

And also that bit of unmapped nothing to the west of THE CUBE. Behold that too.

Oh, just a Quintar. Gaze upon my perfection and be cowed into irrelevance.

Now, as much as I would love to show you what's INSIDE the Ancient Labyrinth, it's not really easy to do so right now.

Entry isn't the problem at first, as long as you have the clues from Salmon Bay and are inquisitive enough to check each of the moving blocks.

Neither is exploration. As mentioned, provided you have the clues, it's a pretty linear experience.

See, getting through the Ancient Labyrinth will occasionally put you at a seeming dead end or puzzle. The Ancient Tablets give the solutions. So here, we need to find the tile three left and one down from this here red lamp.

It folds inwards at a touch.

This drops us into a cramped maze area full of tiny tunnels.

Here's the real problem, though. The Ancient Labyrinth's fights, in addition to being dangerous threats on par with endgame, also lock out anyone from using non-magic abilities. Which means that depending on your character's build, they may not even HAVE a move they can perform down here even with reclassing! This is why I was so adamant about getting GUTS at least two magic-using classes even if he's not built for magic on the whole. Without both Scholar and Nomad on deck, he would be deadweight down here. Everyone else is of course fine.

Well... not this time around. The Puppet armed solely with Bolt and Firen is able to kill the entire team by virtue of two and a half team members being deadweight. When we next come down here, our team comp will be Scholar/Nomad GUTS, Dervish/Wizard Werdna, Summoner/Warlock Frieren, and Cleric/Beatsmith Meena. Caster squad for caster dungeon.

Speaking of, this is my second recording session we're starting on. I usually just play enough for one session and then screenshot from it, but that wasn't enough for a proper update. So here I decide to start showing off what real grinding for LP looks like. At this stage of the game, Dry Kids are slow enough that I can catch them pretty easily and take them down without issue.

The problem is catching the squirrely little things. They're fast and have little-to-no hesitation about escape. I've usually found the best method of approach is to corral them into a corner, then pounce from above, but that assumes terrain advantage we may not necessarily have.

I also found this shield I missed during my earlier explorations. Soundly outclassed now of course, but pretty solid for an Aegis at the time.

I also FINALLY figured out how to get these chests! You gotta take the stairs down to the Undercity entrance, then walk across this beam!

Yeah whatever the real reward is cleaning up my map.

Baaaaah fine. She finished Nomad, I may as well put Meena into Ninja for the sake of having SOMEONE put up with it.

I'm mastering every other class this update anyway. And I do mean Every Class. Mimic's done!

So's Fencer, and so is GUTS with mastering classes for the rest of the game! Barring a possible exception for Scholar, mind you. Until we mess with the Ancient Labyrinth, this is GUTS' default loadout for the rest of the game. I'll probably change one of his accessories to the Nomad's Emblem if I remember.

Sealing it up.

And again.

THE CONCLUSION APPROACHES.

Over by the abandoned sunken shrine, I find a few enemies that flee from us rather than engaging. Curiosity compels me to investigate and...

Higher-level Dry Kid! Higher LP grind income! Also a whole different suite of Monster Magic to look forward to, including the final spell in the roster. Reverse Polarity, Barrier, Overload, Lucky Dice, Atmoshear, and the final spell in the set, Reflection! This is the only source of the spell outside of the Ancient Labyrinth.

Dats some good LXP. Swamp Kids aren't a free upgrade, mind you: they have commensurate stats for where they are, including boatloads of Evasion, and Reflection can shutter any attempts at spell-based offensives, so expect some to get away. Oh, and if you want, you can steal Learner's Pins from them!

They also drop this cool thing!

Assassin shortly afterwards gets mastered, leading me to this loadout for Werdna as his endgame set. Except, y'know, swap Trickery for Black Magic. The Demon armor set isn't strictly super postgame level stuff, but for this build it's one of the best picks we can get.

As evidence, I submit this image. Lifedraining Storm Stance counters are a wondeful thing and my method of choice for getting through the Sky Arena.

We're not home free just yet though. Arachlea, the final fight of the Sky Arena, is a mean piece of work. No tricks except for Impale and Brutal Venom, and while we have the Ribbon for the latter, the former has no such workarounds. More problematic is Arachlea's speed advantage over Werdna and Evasion. Those two things together make this fight a little more luck-reliant than usual. Remember, if a Reaping attack misses, not only do I not get damage, I don't get the turn of poison/bleed OR any potential lifedrain from it. And as strong as Storm Stance is for this and all the fights here, it alone is not enough to outpace Impale's heavy damage.

Not that she even needs Impale. Two crits from Brutal Venom and a basic attack back to back are enough to take us down, even with Lightning topping us off between hits. It'll take a couple attempts here, but when I do, I'll showcase the full Sky Arena in a video (although the first half will probably just be a bunch of frame 1 Guillotine).

Oh would you look at that. That's Scholar sorted as well, then.

Still new enemies to find in the ocean! Biters have Feeding Frenzy and Blood Spiller, and Chompers have Bulk Up and Chomp. All of them have Critical Turn just for the hell of it.

We only have 8 of these things. I think there's still a total of 15. WHERE ARE THEY

Star Flare, Shining Wind, Dream Feast and Hypnotize. That's nice and all, as is starting with free Magic Up, but at this stage, single enemies are way more reasonable fights than swarms. Action economy strikes again.

We keep moving!

Let's get this sucker done and dusted next.

Pah has two major threats to watch out for, both of which strongly check a spellcasting offensive. The first, obviously, is Silver Wind, applying Reflect indefinitely to all combatants. Not only does this require a constant level of attention, it also shutters a few techniques that would otherwise be freebies. Healing magic becomes unreliable, magic counters get dumped right in the attacker's face, and so on. Area spells suffer no such issue, but that leads into the second problem: MP Leak inflicted by Shining Wind. This makes MP reserves a hell of a lot harder to maintain safely, and will bleed the Summoner you are required to take into the fight dry in short order. Fortunately, the workarounds here are pretty simple. For offense, stick to physical attacks or non-magical abilities like Chi Burst. For healing, you can either use area healing or Items from a Chemist. Those won't be reflected, since the Reflect buff only works on single-target magic aimed at the recipient. And, of course, the less dependent on MP your team is, the better. Aside from that, Pah favors a heavy magic offensive, complete with Flare, so be ready for the worst and consider Blackout to shutter that particular angle.

I'm doing a lot this playthrough! I'm gonna be proud of that.

Every class in the game mastered save one.

That leaves only Ninja. As for Frieren, her usual loadout for endgame will be as it will for the Ancient Labyrinth: Summoner/Warlock rocking the Staff of Balance.

One last thing for today and then I can call this update a full one.

A combo of Ice Seal and Chill Blast takes Pamoa's damage from "fine" to "apocalyptic". This is half the Dummy's health in one go!

And Werdna cleans it out with Thunder. Good hustle everyone!

But there's one more training dummy that appears. And it's... moving.

This is what we trained you for, Frieren.

The Level ?? Dummy is a gimmick boss. Every so often, they'll alternate between applying the No Magic or No Physical states to your party, preventing them from using any moves that count as those things. So at the very least, you need a team that can hybrid a little bit (or with abilities that ignore those restrictions outright, like Chi Burst, the Item command, and so forth). Moreover, the Dummy itself is a fierce contender, with Blood Spiller and a costless Guillotine as its moveset. There's a way to cheese this fight, which I demonstrate here: a Mimic's abilities can Copy the No Physical ability, rendering the Dummy completely unable to harm you. So if you have a properly leveled Mimic and can weather the opening assault without magic, the second they hit you with No Physical, you can turn them off and just win the fight without any danger whatsoever. Assuming you don't have a leveled Mimic for just such an occasion, again, your best bet is the Item subcommand for healing combined with a hybrid style of offensive and as much physical damage mitigation as you can muster.

Your prize is the Training Sword, which is another great help for LP grinding at this stage and also a pretty solid weapon in its own right. Plus, enabling the full moveset for all your commands even if you haven't used them at all is convenient, if perhaps not super impressive tied to a weapon.

Anyway, now that everyone's hit level cap, it's time to do some respeccing. I'm not going superhog with this, just finetuning everyone's levelset for the roles they have. Again, my endgame party is going to likely be a roster of GUTS as Nomad/Warrior, Werdna as Reaper/Wizard, Frieren as Summoner/Warlock, and Meena as Monk/Valkyrie, with adjustments for specific boss fights as needed. So I want to finetune their stats to fit the roles they have. Functionally the changes won't mean much here or there.

And as you can see from the stat adjustments, the changes across the board are very small ones, shaving unneeded points elsewhere to get a little more of an edge where they need it.

Note the prices on this. I'm retooling about 10-15 levels per character which isn't even breaking a single gold on them. If I wanted to just say "screw it everyone has 60 levels in Beatsmith" and do that for some reason, I could probably afford to do that!

It's hardly a massive gamechanger, but you can do it and I like that.

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
  • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
• Explore Beaurior Volcano.
  • Explore Beaurior Rock.
    • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
    • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
  • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
  • Find the Valkyrie class.
• Explore the Open Sea.
  • Explore the Sequoia.
  • Explore the Deep Sea.
    • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
    • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
    • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
    • Explore Neptune Shrine.
      • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
    • Explore the Depths.
      • Find the Cerulean Book.
• Explore the Chalice of Tar.
  • Find the Vermillion Book.
  • Find the White Crystal.
  • Find the Mimic class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
• Explore Jidamba Tangle.
  • Obtain the Europa Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
  • Find the Foliage Key.
  • Find the Canopy Key.
  • Find the Cave Key.
  • Defeat Rexosaur.
  • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
    • Find the Viridian Book.
    • Find the Orchid Crystal.
    • Find the Weaver class.
    • Find the Salmon Violin.

 

[Mogri]

Dervish Robe
Light Armor
Defense: +55
Resistance: +190
Mind: +40
Spirit: +40
+6 AP after using magic.

I... don't entirely know how best to use this. Like, for accelerating the user's AP gain it's great and all... but as with the Nomad Vest before it, the class that most readily comes to mind for spending AP is Samurai, which can't equip this. A Dervish CAN use it for weird accelerated MP gain and support of an AP using subcommand, but that feels weird and janky to me. And if you're just in it for the stats... Scholar Robe or Shaman Robe are right there, just use those. Someone who's good at theorycrafting help me with this.

Isn't this like an obviously super good pick for Nomad, who spends AP to use magic in the first place and wants both Mind and Spirit?

 

[Torzelbaum]

Aegis Mail
Heavy Armor

Really think this should have been a shield.

 

[Kalir]

Sorry for the delay on this. It will happen again. Anyway, first things first: let's get those damn dang darn Gold Ingots!

No more fooling around. For this, I'm looking up the ingot locations on the Fandom wiki. Turns out that some absolute lunatic rigged up a really nice map system there that lets you check off or search for specific treasures on each region, and enumerated all the places that hold what I'm looking for. I don't like Fandom of course, but hey, can't knock the results.

Really though, for this one at least I have absolutely no excuse for missing it.

Now, at first I wasn't using the fancy fancy map, just the list of locations, which led to me finding this out on the Overpass. Don't need but we sure do have it.

Oh I REALLY have no excuse for missing this one. Come on! We got the treasure up there and this is clearly in eyeshot! Slacking!

Gold weapons and armor! Done! Heeeeeeegh!

Next up, this!

To survive in the Sky Arena, you basically need four things: the Ribbon (else Singubean kills you), Defense (else everything else kills you), self-sustain, and both physical and magical offense. Reaper/Wizard is the answer I have personally settled on for this fight, owing to the strong combo of Storm Stance, the Demon armor set granting spell lifesteal, and of course, the overwhelming power of both Reaping and Black Magic to take down any foes. That said, I'm sure there are plenty of builds you can run for this fight. Warlocks with their mastery armor can wipe the floor with every fight except Mage Knight as long as their MP holds out. Monks have access to Counter and can run out the clock with Chakra and Chi Burst. As long as they can survive a single hit, Shamans can basically have their way with every fight using their strong parcel of lifedrain and control. You get the idea. This string of encounters, culminating with Arachlea at the top, is a puzzle you have the tools to solve.

We get our fair share of prizes for this, but for my money, Muramasa is the winner of the lot by far. Unlike most katanas, Muramasa has no extra attributes to it. No element, no AP gain, no counter ignoring, just pure Attack. Which is actually exactly what a Samurai wants! Remember, they already get passives for half that stuff anyway! Why not spend that on extra power?

The other finds are nice, sure. Yasha is an excellent Ninja dagger, if perhaps less attractive to a Rogue or Assassin than a more murder-oriented tool.

And then there's some good medium armor! Cool great cool.

I didn't see it at the time, but this actually has a second floor to it. Tricky tricky devious. I'll just pop down there and check what's what without fussing with recording...

Ah, nothing serious. Just some high-end consumables and a bit more diamond. But still, it bugged me!

Anyway, more diamond means more upgrades!

And then I did Swamp Kid grinding until I mastered Ninja.

All classes done!

Fun fact: Windows decided to reboot without saving anything or telling me while I was writing the update, so all the text you see before this point was written several days before any further text. It sucks! Anyway here's Meena's endgame build. Our party will be Nomad/Warrior GUTS, Reaper/Wizard Werdna, Summoner/Warlock Frieren, and Monk/Valkyrie Meena. I'll shift this around as certain fights demand, but for facechecking fights this is the team.

Speaking of facechecking fights, let's make our way to the Deep Sea and the Depths.

A few enemies get in our way, but the only notable one is this Coral Eater. It's resistant to Fire and Water, and has a mean combo of Cauterizer, Spit Fire, and Harden for a moveset. Don't fight one, it's not worth it.

For our first excursion into the Depths, we'll be checking out the pit the lonely salmon swam into. It's actually isolated from the rest of the Depths proper, but despite or even due to this, it makes an ideal starting point.

The first reason to go into the Depths is diamond veins. It's positively loaded with them, to the point where trying to get a full set of diamond gear without the Depths is impossible, while getting a full set from the Depths alone might not be.

So yeah, we're also gonna finish off our diamond collection this update.

The true prize of the Depths, though, are the bosses. This is the first time I've ever swam down to one without being seen.

Good. Time for some big game hunting.

The Old One is the first of four Depths bosses, and in my experience the easiest by far. See, their moveset is pretty simple: Wither turns off a target's Vitality stat, Dark Overture is it's usual heavy area magic damage, and their Torpedo move summons an enemy of the same name who immediately casts Explode. It's easy to see the route this fight is intended to take: the Old One summons a steady stream of Torpedos that hammer you with high Explode damage constantly. The problem is that this plan requires so many pieces for the enemy to get into place that you can sleepwalk it with almost any comp. There are an absurd number of ways to just not take damage from this fight for an extended period of time, opening yourself up for a free head-on assault. Area attacks to quick kill the Torpedo while also piling damage onto the Old One are nice. Blackout prevents the Torpedos from doing damage. And all of the Old One's moves have a CT cost to them, so you really don't even have to pay attention to the Wither status effect because it'll be cleared by the next time they act. Kind of a disappointment, honestly.

In addition to the Deity Eye all of the Depths bosses drop, the Old One drops the Master Material, which is an accessory that opens up the full moveset of all equipped classes. Same as the Training Sword, actually! It's handy if you don't want to grind out LXP for great lengths of time.

I head back to Capital Sequoia afterwards, buying this thing on impulse. It turns out to be an endgame-viable dagger with a 10% chance to inflict Blind. Sure!

Oh, by the way, you can steal this from any Depths boss, or grab it from the Lost & Found after winning one fight. Another reason to hit the Old One first.

We'll explore the rest of the Depths and put the bosses on the map, but we're not gonna beat them all just yet. Next up is this spot, east of the Quintar Reserve.

If you don't feel like blind checking bosses, the number one rule to remember is that their habitat is always the darkest parts of the Depths. Light is only useful to surface dwellers, after all, and makes it harder for them to approach unseen.

The second one is right at the start of this canal, inside a minicavern.

As mentioned, I'm only fighting the Old One this update. The others require more intricate strats to handle. In the case of the Peacekeeper, you need area attacks to handle its multiple Tentamouths, but since they each have different elemental absorptions, you need more than one source of area damage. More on their strats when I actually fight them, of course.

As mentioned, stick to the lit parts of the Depths if you're just in it for the treasure. Bioluminescent plants and veins of diamond glimmer in the dark.

And with the map on hand they're easy to see as you pass over them.

Our next mark is a ways down the chasm, parked approximately at the point the raft takes from Sara Sara Bazaar to Shoudu Province. Funny how that works.

I'll at least fight everything here to show it off, but again, note the plants here being completely dark. Ideal ambush territory.

The Devourer is a fun one, because their methodology is a lot of technical nuance that ultimately serves a very simple goal of "hit you really really hard". They're fast, and they open the fight with this Chum The Waters spell, which does meager damage but inflicts the Chum debuff, magnifying physical damage taken by a terrifying +150%. Again, I'll gloss over the details for now, but suffice it to say the usual tank-and-disrupt strat that works on most bosses doesn't do a thing here.

There's only one spot in the Depths with any treasure, and if you think back you might already know what to expect here. This is a little south of the Devourer's habitat.

That's all three books to get us into the Sequoia Athenaeum!

Continuing on, the Depths starts to go underneath the seafloor.

And it's not long before we find a strange, unearthly, yet familiar growth.

There's diamond to be found here too, but the real point of interest is the core of this cavern.

This thing, which is simply called STEM, is the gateway to the postgame bosses' crown jewel. Of course, without STEM WARD, we can't even get close to it. I know where to obtain it, but that's gonna be a future update. Probably the next one, feels like a boss rush kind of update coming.

For now, we'll leave it be and continue on. It does feel like whatever is here is the core of the ambiguous corruption that wrecked the pipeline project.

By now we've curved around the mainland and are south of Shoudu Province by a considerable amount.

Been grabbing diamond aplenty down here. All that remains is...

The hiding place of the most devious of the Depths bosses.

The Enforcer is a tricksy villain whose gameplan can best be summed up by describing two of its unique traits: any buffs it receives and any debuffs it inflicts last indefinitely. Without ways to clear both buffs and debuffs quickly and easily, you don't stand a chance. Oh, and don't think you can just sub in your own debuffs instead, it's immune to damage over time. Have fun, if you can.

Anyway that's all the craftwork weapons upgraded as far as they can go!

Enough deep sea gallivanting. Let's do some research.

No fighting to be had here, just treasure and puzzles.

The puzzles can be very tricky indeed if you don't have a good head for sliding blocks, but as mentioned, I do have that.

This is also the densest the lore of Crystal Project ever gets. We got a sample back at the Boomer Society, but here's where it really starts to unfold.

Project Name: Capital Agriculture
Current Status: IN PROGRESS

A garden in Capital Sequoia where which seeds can be planted and grown. When seeds hatch, various things emerge. Rumours of vulnerabilities may not be baseless. What kind of seed could cause corruption?

A Home Point connects a citizen's essence to the land of Sequoia. Upon death, a citizen's body is absorbed into the conduit of the land. Home Points are specific locations which connect the material land with this conduit, and they are used as places of rebirth after death.

All citizens who have been Banished have had their history erased alongside them. There remains no record of who has been Banished nor any reasons for issuing Banishes. No Grand Master in the land of Sequoia's history has ever attempted to change this.

The incumbent Grand Master's identity is unknown to the citizens of the land of Sequoia. No previous Grand Master in the land's history has ever concealed their identity. Additionally, and by no coincidence, no previous Grand Master's policies have ever been so disliked.

Death by monsters and death by other citizens is functionally the same. Neither results in being Banished under current Grand Master law. However it is not unprecedented for death by other citizens to result in being Banished under historic rule.

Project Name: Rexosaur
Current Status: IMPLEMENTED

A fearsome dinosaur roams the foliage of Jidamba Tangle. Is to encounter this rare beast lucky or unlucky?

Lots to digest here. First, it seems like previous Grand Masters usually tried to put some kind of project into play to change the world of Sequoia. Going by the MMO analogy, and given that Grand Masters are "elected" by defeating the previous one, it feels kind of like... if this was an MMO, it's a private server for one, hosted by modders. So in a "vanilla" Sequoia, we'd have neither a garden in the capital nor a hidden Rexosaur boss. That's cool and all, but seriously everything about how Banishes are handled here is messed up. Can't even blame the current Grand Master for going into hiding and anonymity; if I was in charge here I wouldn't want to be banned just because someone figured out an exploit to beat me.

Anyway, remember the golden rule for sliding block puzzles: if you're making a move with a block, you need to be sure that you can make another move after it. Our goal is to take this block around to the west end of the first floor.

This gives us enough height to jump up here!

And we need to keep going, clearly.

You'll need an ibek and owl at a minimum here, but considering where the books were hidden, you have those already.

The switch will open the door, and this helm will open a heavy armored caster's mind to the possibility of 6 AP per cast. Honestly pretty solid for, say, a Samurai running Mixed Magic or Time Magic as a second moveset. Or a heavy armor user running Waterbend, of course.

Anyway, that was just the sampler. The real puzzles are ahead.

We'll need to solve them all in sequence, as the door to the next is locked by an Ice Puzzle Key, which is in that box up here. This one's piss-easy to solve though.

Yeah. Yeah, it's easy.

If you really don't have a head for these, I think after getting this one you can just buy them at the Lost & Found.

Yep. Remember my rule and this one's easy.

The ice blocks are very sensitive though, so use the switch to reset 'em if you mess up.

Anyway yeah. Push it right to start and everything else will follow naturally.

B2F is where it starts getting a little spicier, but still nothing I can't handle.

Two ice blocks makes my rule harder to follow, but it's still a good rule of thumb. No matter how you push them, either block WILL get stuck moved on its own, so our goal is to use one to set up the other.

For my part, I set up the left block like so.

And from there, it's simplicity itself.

Project Name: Hermetic
Current Status: UNCONFIRMED

Legend says that something may be burrowing through the snow of Tall, Tall Heights. It is said that it can occasionally be seen on the surface of the snow, but will quickly burrow back out of sight.

Further in you'll find even more lore droplets from other researchers. Nothing we haven't seen of course, but the clues for someone who hasn't encountered these particular bosses before are nice.

This one can be a bit tricky given the difficulty in maneuvering the blocks, but I used this solution. First, send the rightside block here, so you can park it right in front of the lane ahead.

This lets you send it down this narrow alley, which gets it right where it needs to be.

Like so!

Three blocks makes this puzzle a little intimidating, but again, you only need one to get to the end.

So here's how I did it. The first block, I just threw straight up and then here, to this wall. One of the blocks is a red herring, you just need to get a second one to that right position, using the wood post on the left side of the upper level. Shove the other one out of the way to clear space, anywhere really.

Not bad.

Nearing the end here.

Final exam. This is the toughest one. Pull it off and you get a very tasty prize.

This solution isn't as clean as my others. I got one block up to the position in the upper left, easily, but for this one I had to get these blocks here so I could nudge one next to the previous block. As long as you can get at least one of the other two blocks here to push up, you can make it work, inelegant though it may be.

Ah well. Results is results.

Down to the final floor and its reward.

Project Name: The Labyrinth
Current Status: IMPLEMENTED

A mysterious labyrinth emanates with mystery and magical energy in the northern Poko Poko and Sara Sara regions.

Project Name: The Continental Pipeline
Current Status: ABANDONED

An underwater tram which is to connect the various cities and islands in the land of Sequoia.

Reason for abandonment: Previous Grand Master was Banished. Other complications were rumored.

Yeah, "other complications". You mean the fact that an unknown meat force is currently digging a massive cavity into the pipeline. That's something else we're doing next time, by the way. We're investigating that.

Anyway, check it! The Skeleton Key is the strongest key in the game, unlocking any other key-locked door as though it was the original key. We've found almost every other key there is to find, but if you don't feel like trawling the Deep Sea for the Ramparts or Forgotten Keys, this is a fine replacement.

This is the intended method to gain access to the storeroom of the Luxury Shop.

Some nice finds in here, albeit situational ones. A rare Fenix Syrup Pouch is nice, but the Lucky Socks are... iffy. This accessory modifies the Lucky Dice spell, occasionally giving it a chance to become multitarget.

There's also the Lucky Briefs, allowing you to build for Variance even on a caster. Honestly not a bad pick for a Shaman looking for some extra edge!

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
      • Obtain the Skeleton Key.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
  • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
• Explore Beaurior Volcano.
  • Explore Beaurior Rock.
    • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
    • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
  • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
  • Find the Valkyrie class.
• Explore the Open Sea.
  • Explore the Sequoia.
  • Explore the Deep Sea.
    • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
    • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
    • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
    • Explore Neptune Shrine.
      • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
    • Explore the Depths.
      • Find the Cerulean Book.
      • Defeat the Old One.
      • Defeat the Peacekeeper.
      • Defeat the Devourer.
      • Defeat the Enforcer.
• Explore the Chalice of Tar.
  • Find the Vermillion Book.
  • Find the White Crystal.
  • Find the Mimic class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
• Explore Jidamba Tangle.
  • Obtain the Europa Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
  • Find the Foliage Key.
  • Find the Canopy Key.
  • Find the Cave Key.
  • Defeat Rexosaur.
  • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
    • Find the Viridian Book.
    • Find the Orchid Crystal.
    • Find the Weaver class.
    • Find the Salmon Violin.

 

[Kalir]

Today we're doing a short but sweet update. As you can see from my jankety ass configuration, I have strats in mind, and I intend to employ those strats against bosses. In particular, we got the remaining bosses of the Depths, plus one or two others.

First up!

The Devourer is a boss that has a very uncomplicated strategy of "hit your guys really hard" but a VERY intricate methodology for it. It opens the fight with Chum the Waters, a weak area spell that inflicts Chum on all targets. Chum magnifies physical damage taken by an obscene 150%, so clearing it is a must for getting out of the fight alive. The Devourer only ever attacks with Chomp, which isn't too bad, but if the target has Chum, they're all but guaranteed dead on hit. While on paper this sounds like an easy fight to control, the Devourer adamantly resists almost all such attempts, with Amnesia forcing a reset of all accumulated Threat and Cleanse shrugging off all debuffs and adding an immunity to a few for kicks. So stuff like Blind, Power Down, etc. is all but out of the picture unless immaculately timed. But, as you can see, Aegis is a uniquely viable class here because of how its defensive mechanisms work. Have Sam the Sadist drop everyone but the Aegis to critical levels of HP prior to the fight, then clear Chum on your Aegis, and as long as they can weather the Devourer's attacks (and if they're doing their job right, they can) you're all set. Dodge effects like Blink or Smokescreen also work here if you don't have an Aegis ready and waiting for this fight, and while Cleanse can do a lot to keep the Devourer from being debuffed, it's not a foolproof answer provided you time your debuffs right and prioritize ones that will outright shut down its turn, rather than blunt the damage.

Our prize is the Assassin's Cloak, which is incredibly powerful for a Weaver using a subcommand of Trickery or Execute. Percentile boosts to core stats go hard.

Yeah there's not really a lot left as far as exploration goes. There's the Ancient Labyrinth and the Sequoia, and Castle Sequoia to wrap it up... that's really about it.

The Enforcer's main trick is being better at buffs and debuffs than you. Any buffs or debuffs it sets don't expire, and it's flat immune to damage over time. It also inflicts Weakness on you whenever it hits, so you take double damage from DOT effects, and Pain Spreader will give you more and more of those as it connects. It also uses Sleep Aura to vibecheck you if you walk in unprepared, and MP Arrest, Barrier, and Harden to put attrition even more in its favor. You flat need both debuff and buff clearing to get through this fight, and with MP Arrest making casting a daunting proposition, some manner of either restoring it or going without is worth looking into. For those reasons, Warlock, Chemist, and Beastmaster are all solid picks for this fight. Tanking characters might not get any value out of drawing aggro, but Valkyrie and Monk can both basically no-sell the Enforcer's damage for themselves, leaving them free to run support. And while Rogue is a generically good class if you can support it for lots of classes, the Enforcer is probably the postgame fight where it shines the most. Since the Enforcer relies on landing AOE hits to win, Reflex Stance keeps the Rogue alive indefinitely, and timed Eye Gouges can spare your team a lot of suffering. This one sucks to go into blind, but there's ample amounts of counterplay to be had.

Ghendolf's Ring is an accessory that gives loads of Mind, and that's nice and good. It's a thing you can and probably will equip.

Uncharacteristically, this go around I had the most trouble with Peacekeeper! Took me several tries to take them down. Usually my sticking point is Devourer, but I've never done the White Knight strat for it before. Anyway,

The Peacekeeper relies on their army of Tentamouths, each armed with Blood Suck, Wrap, and different elemental absorptions to wear down your team before they can react. So, obviously, the answer to this fight is area damage. Only problem is that most sources of area damage are elementally typed, which means that at least one of the dudes is gonna heal up from it. There's a few ways to answer this. One way is to rely on area damage without an elemental typing. Reaper and Shaman are among the best picks for this with Nightfall/Bloodwell or Epidemic respectively, but there's also Fencer's Swallowtail or Hunter's Barrage as options, or even Samurai's Ken: Omnislice. The other is to suck it up and stick to one or two elements to clear out the bulk of em, and then just spike down whichever one remains, which is what I did here. Summoner is an especially strong pick for the latter if you're okay with some overlap, since you're not only doing massive damage to all but one enemy per casting, you're usually stuffing them all for a turn with a rude debuff. Once all the Tentamouths are disposed of, all that really remains is the Peacekeeper's moveset, which is nothing to write home about. It's basically the Canal Beast from waaaaaay back in Draft Shaft Conduit but with some more endgame single-target moves like Wrap and Devour. You might hit some snags with your MP depleted, but that moveset's not a lot to worry about and the Peacekeeper's personal stats don't give it much kick for this stage.

Guardian Angel is a really nice armor set for your tank, if perhaps a little lacking on Resistance. Built in extra Threat generation and Reraise is always nice. Alternately, it can be used as insurance for a Reaper who plays a little too fast and loose with their HP.

That's all the Depths bosses! Next up, investigating the aberration partway through the Continental Tram.

Looks comfy, in we go.

A few more diamond deposits we no longer need, and our next target.

Conscript's existence raises a lot of questions with no answers, but its moveset is pretty comprehensible. Bone Crunch we already know, Doom Song applies Death Sentence to the party, Goop Expand is a scalar move designed to drop a target to critical health, and Hocus Pocus gives everyone on your side some rude status effect. We're actually a tad overleveled for this fight, I think, but even without that this isn't too hard. The big threat is the many, many status effects you're gonna take. Conscript's direct damage is limited to basic attacks and Bone Crunch, so it's almost entirely reliant on Doom Song and Hocus Pocus to shut down your plans. So as long as you've got good reliable debuff clearing, you're set. Warlock, Monk and Cleric are the best fighters for the job here, and that leaves at least two of your team free to do their favorite damage rotations until Conscript stops moving.

Our prize for beating Conscript is STEM WARD, which as we all know is necessary to approach STEM. This opens up another boss fight we can do, and which I probably could have fit into this update but elected not to. It's kinda the crown jewel of postgame, y'see. We'll let it simmer.

Final boss fight we're doing this update is, unfortunately, Rexosaur. Which means the real hurdle is grinding through random encounters in Jidamba Tangle's foliage layer until we hit the one it's disguised as. Functionally, every time you reset the encounters there, Rexosaur chooses one to replace, I think? Do not quote me on this I haven't dived this game's source. So you're stuck digging through nontrivial encounters that, while we're in no danger of losing to, still cost us precious time to deal with. If you're intent on hunting a Rexosaur, I strongly recommend a Rogue or Chemist to enable fleeing. Technically a Ninja could do it too but don't do that to yourself.

To make matters worse, there is a very real chance of wiping to Rexosaur despite your search. Now you have to do it again. Losing to any other boss is whatever, you can bounce back to where they were none the worse for wear. In Rexosaur's case, you now have to fish those encounters all over again!

AND you lose cash for dying to a "standard flame"! Scandal!

Anyway, Rexosaur's a big mean birdosaurus whose best weapon is just having better stats than you. Fissure gives it a monstrously powerful area attack, and Bone Crunch and Devour need no introduction. At lower health totals it'll enter a Fierce Stance just for that little extra bit of spite. It is almost insultingly straightforward of a boss battle, just a single large target with overwhelming power. About the only thing I'd say you need is ways to reduce its horrendous damage output, but hey, that's Crystal Project for you. You should already have several ways of applying Power and Magic Down to them, and Armor or Resist Up to your team, as needed. Really the hardest thing was spending a solid HOUR sifting through foliage flames until I got this winning attempt.

The Rex Vest we get as a prize is pretty cool though. Solid medium armor with a percentile Agility boost and an amplifier to basic attacks, and I know that's an unappealing package to a lot of players but I'm not gonna underestimate the power of basic attacks in this game.

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
      • Obtain the Skeleton Key.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
      • Defeat Conscript.
      • Obtain STEM WARD.
    • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
      • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
  • Explore Beaurior Volcano.
    • Explore Beaurior Rock.
      • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
      • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
    • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
    • Find the Valkyrie class.
  • Explore the Open Sea.
    • Explore the Sequoia.
    • Explore the Deep Sea.
      • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
      • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
      • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
      • Explore Neptune Shrine.
        • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
      • Explore the Depths.
        • Find the Cerulean Book.
        • Defeat the Old One.
        • Defeat the Peacekeeper.
        • Defeat the Devourer.
        • Defeat the Enforcer.
  • Explore the Chalice of Tar.
    • Find the Vermillion Book.
    • Find the White Crystal.
    • Find the Mimic class.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
  • Explore Jidamba Tangle.
    • Obtain the Europa Stone.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
    • Find the Foliage Key.
    • Find the Canopy Key.
    • Find the Cave Key.
    • Defeat Rexosaur.
    • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
      • Find the Viridian Book.
      • Find the Orchid Crystal.
      • Find the Weaver class.
      • Find the Salmon Violin.

 

[Mogri]

Does Rex respawn?

 

[Kalir]

Great question! I don't want to take the steps necessary to find the answer because I already sifted through the foliage for an hour!

 

[Mogri]

Fair!

 

[Kalir]

For today's mission, we're setting off for one of Crystal Project's more esoteric regions, the Ancient Labyrinth. Which means that we need to make sure everyone on our team has at least two caster class options, and as those of you playing along at home might have noticed, that's by no means a guarantee! Many physical builds have no levels in casting classes and no incentive to level them up, so most players will have to grind at least a little to get in, both for LXP and for the cash needed to respec. Image unrelated, where I'm finishing up mapping the Deep Sea.

Hehe spire crab.

And valley crab.

Deep Sea map done! Technically the overworld layer isn't fully mapped out yet, there's some spots around Yamagawa that I need to clean up, but I do love a pretty map.

Anyway, the team comp. Frieren's doing the same thing she's always done, Summoner/Warlock. Werdna's going Dervish/Shaman, no real reason there, it's just a really solid offense caster combo. GUTS is doing Scholar/Nomad because... that's all he's got, really. He doesn't have magic movesets outside of those. The only real curveball is Meena, who is using Cleric/Beatsmith. I could do a lot of things with Meena, but I elected for Beatmaker as her subcommand primarily for Mana Song, as an all-caster team struggles hard with MP during long fights. Rhapsody and Requiem aren't half bad either since they're both instant and synergize strongly with caster gang, and let's be real, she doesn't NEED the physical half of Beatmaker anyway with the perfectly functional support toolkit of White Magic available.

INTO THE CUBE

Right, this part we've already done. We got walled on the first encounter by virtue of not having a team comp for this area, but that's not gonna happen this time!

See? We've got this for sure.

We want to get to those boxes, yes we do. But we're fenced in by those weird rectangle pipes that are so common down here.

Either direction will let us approach that corridor from one of two sides. I recall this being a "map at the end" sort of dungeon and individual floors aren't too complex, so we're going this way first for the red box.

This is why I'm climbing on all of the pipes here, but I don't think it actually affects the map or leads to treasure or anything.

The left route takes us to a pit to the next floor, one-way. But there's also a secret hole in the wall that leads to the treasures! Can you see it?

The enemy in that hallway is this formation, which is how most people who don't learn about grinding Swamp Kids will get Reflection. See, the Puppetmaster can do Firen, Bolten, and Boltena, as well as Safeguard as a counterspell. But they can also Activate any other Puppets in the fight, giving them higher stats and better moves, including Reflection. And just getting to a Puppetmaster fight already requires you to commit to the bit of Ancient Labyrinth, in all likelihood. You can see why not many people go for it.

Activated puppets hurt by the way.

That fight was hairy, but I got a really cool drop from it! Codex is honestly even better than the Staff of Balance for Summoners, who really need that MP for extra summons more than they need raw scalar strength. And hey, they still get a LITTLE scalar strength, plus some HP! Frieren's keeping this on hand for the rest of the game.

The armor in the box is real good too.

Gotta get past this snarl of a construction for the other box.

Gee I wonder if there's a secret passage in the wall.

Just some cash and a diamond ingot. Don't need it, but it's there, so we're taking it.

Who forgot to adjust their passives? Is it me? Yes.

Got this cool shield off a Marionette enemy that probably does things I dunno. Nice for your wandhavers! Or in GUTS' case, your magical rapier havers.

Anyway, next floor.

This is where the next puzzle happens. The next few floors are a fallthrough section, but if you don't do it in the right order, the door at the end won't unlock.

We have the order riiiight here.

Each floor will have a different formation, but not one so convoluted that the correct order is intentionally obtuse.

They got dang ol' unicrons down here! Forbidden Grace absorbs Thunder and inflicts debuffs without taking an action, and uses Stun Lock plus the usual Deathly Chill + Icena combo. Sucks, it does!

Ooo box.

Ultragood healertanker crown. In addition to a 10% heal bonus, it also doubles HP regen effects on the wearer! If Valkyries could wear this they'd never take it off, but just having Valhalla on a healer or even a teammate makes it work splendidly.

Anyway, next floor. If you don't want to catch Forbidden Grace's hands, it's actually a very straight shot through the puzzle, but there are boxes and I can open them and I want to.

Do it right, and the door north of here will click open. The tile to the south lets you warp back up to retry it if you made a mistake.

Orange flames? My dogg, we are at LEVEL CAP. What are you doing?!

You can avoid them with precision platforming onto the pipes, as they do not jump. But if you're at level cap, you can take 'em.

Ah yes, Robot.

Robot has Bolt (yeah, just basic standard Bolt), Icena, Landslide, and Stun Lock. It has no other tricks beyond stats. Honestly, you shouldn't have any issue with them.

They also drop Ether Shields, I guess?

Branching paths mean treasure! Explore all possibilities!

South is the route further down.

East has a Zether Pouch, fine cool.

And north has Judgement, a staff that's actually not half bad for a Cleric that finds themselves casting Star Flare with any degree of frequency. Any other caster is usually gonna want a Mind stat boost from the Staff of Balance, Codex, or just a wand first, though.

The final floor is a set of 4x4 rooms, each with a switch in the center.

Along the north and west walls are a small amount of signs, each with a single character. This is your clue for how to proceed, but the answer is, as before, on an Ancient Tablet.

Hit these three switches to open the path down. I think any other combo of three will instead reset all switches. Don't know for sure, never tried it and not going to! Gotta leave SOME unexplored mysteries for others playing this!

Still enemies down here, but they patrol slowly and are easily avoided or defeated as the case may be, considering who could even make it down here to start with.

Hope you're cool with me skipping a bunch of identical screenshots of identical rooms.

We land in a tar reservoir, dimly lit by a network of platforms. Three of them are positioned to catch people falling from one of the three apertures we opened up.

Yeah cool thanks. We're basically done by now but thanks.

We're given a home point here if we want to change our configuration for the boss of course there's a boss. I don't need it.

Let's beat it down and claim our reward!

Anubis is a pretty fitting check to the magic-only parties that would explore the Ancient Labyrinth. In addition to a fearsome roster of spells including MP Sickle, Bolten, Icena, and Flare (and also Fire I guess), Anubis has two major tricks. The first is Wall Change, a stance that gives them full immunity to five of the six elements at the expense of taking double damage from the sixth. This means you either need a wide assortment of elemental casters on your party, plenty of untyped casting damage, or a bit of both. My team comp only lacks for Thunder, and of the typings that remain, GUTS can hit everything but Earth and can do untyped with Lucky Dice, Werdna's got Wind and Earth off Prayer magic and untyped off Hex Magic, Frieren can hit every element but usually only once outside of Fire/Water/Ice, and Meena's only got untyped damage with either Requiem or Star Flare. Big problem there is making sure you've spread out your elemental damage classes among your four party members, which is even less of a guarantee than having everyone with at least two caster classes in the first place. The second twist Anubis has is an on-death cast of Meteorite, which is a fixed 9999 damage spell to everything left standing. The easiest fix is to just Summon Juses prior to landing the fatal blow, but as long as even a single party member lives it, it counts as a win, so Valhalla's Re-Raise or equipment that grants a revive will also work. Alternately, I think you can try to land a Silence or similar action-denying effect on Anubis just before they die as well.

The first prize we get for winning is Adjudicator, a very nice scythe for a Dervish that really wishes they could kill bosses more efficiently. In fact, rumor has it that Adjudicator can even work its laser focusing effect on Meteor! I almost want to test that out myself...

The second prize is considerably less exciting. The Mirror Shield's persistent Reflect buff definitely sounds broken and cool on paper, but as with similar "buff on start" items, the effect goes away if the user dies. And Reflect is good, but it does nothing against non-magical attacks (and that Defense penalty does you no favors there) nor does it affect area magic. It's basically only useful against single-target magic, and we did kinda just take down the most magic-focused boss in the game. But hey, we have it!

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
      • Obtain the Skeleton Key.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
    • Defeat Anubis.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
      • Defeat Conscript.
      • Obtain STEM WARD.
    • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
      • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
  • Explore Beaurior Volcano.
    • Explore Beaurior Rock.
      • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
      • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
    • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
    • Find the Valkyrie class.
  • Explore the Open Sea.
    • Explore the Sequoia.
    • Explore the Deep Sea.
      • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
      • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
      • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
      • Explore Neptune Shrine.
        • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
      • Explore the Depths.
        • Find the Cerulean Book.
        • Defeat the Old One.
        • Defeat the Peacekeeper.
        • Defeat the Devourer.
        • Defeat the Enforcer.
  • Explore the Chalice of Tar.
    • Find the Vermillion Book.
    • Find the White Crystal.
    • Find the Mimic class.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
  • Explore Jidamba Tangle.
    • Obtain the Europa Stone.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
    • Find the Foliage Key.
    • Find the Canopy Key.
    • Find the Cave Key.
    • Defeat Rexosaur.
    • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
      • Find the Viridian Book.
      • Find the Orchid Crystal.
      • Find the Weaver class.
      • Find the Salmon Violin.

 

[Mogri]

That to-do list is getting mighty sparse...

 

[Torzelbaum]

The armor in the box is real good too.

Frieren seems to disagree.

That to-do list is getting mighty sparse...

Might have to change it to done.

 

[Kalir]

What it is?

It's The Sequoia time. No other time but that. Back to my usual party configuration now and forever unless a particular boss gives me some serious issues.

Despite the organic exterior, the interior is pure gamified platforming.

As evidence, I submit the very first thing you see on entry. While you are expected to have a Golden Quintar to do this dungeon, it's possible to do with just a salmon and owl, provided you're comfy with hotswapping in midair. Don't mess up though, because if the owl hits the drink, DO IT ALL OVER AGAIN.

Unfortunately for me, I have a Golden Quintar, so I have no such fear.

I do mean pure platforming, by the way. The enemies here are about as proactive as the ones on Slip Glide Ride. Just stay out of their tile and you're set.

Again, conveying distance on a purely vertical map is hard, but if you're running it owl/salmon style, this is the first point where you can unclench for a bit.

Which is, of course, the perfect time to throw a curveball on the structure. It's not THAT high up, but it's high enough!

The chest in that hideyhole has this cool cape that comes with the good part of Reflex Stance for free. Perfect for a healer, if I do say so myself.

Honestly this early part isn't too bad even with just salmon alone.

Hole.

Oh yeah we're not JUST ascending the trunk. We're gonna go out to these branches every so often for side treasures!

Imagine still needing diamond.

I hate that name actually.

This thing is basically a baby Crag Demon. Chomp, Devour, Fire Breath, and Fierce Stance.

Back in the tree. Again, this is doable with owl/salmon and hotswapping alone, but I earned this stupid gaudy birdosaur.

I dunno, just ain't a lot to say here. When the challenge is pure platforming, screenshots ain't the way, but then I'd have to drop everything for a fight if I was doing this video style, and I'm not changing format for a single dungeon this late in the game.

I can't even take shots of scenery here, because this isn't scenery. This is weird as hell for the sake of platforming challenge, yeah, but scenery? I dunno about that one.

The most interesting thing here is that despite all the platforming here taking the same three tiles on the y axis, we're still able to move south far enough to fall off. I think, in theory, you could do some skips with some really creative angled jumps.

I actually get in a fight here! Shaken Roots have Headbutt and Harden, and Veils have Slow, Explode, and Takeover. Both of them treat healing as damage taken, and are weak to Water. So suffice it to say that GUTS is eatin' good on this dungeon.

Nice of them to illuminate the passage with that red mood lighting.

This is the way forward, there's no more ascending from that part of the trunk. So across the branches we will go!

Yeah uh I was not ready for how hard GUTS actually hits right now. This is a high variance En-Water crit, but still! Damn son!

The branches aren't the only route along the exterior! You can climb the trunk to access some good rare deals if you do it right.

Like this medium headgear! In addition to slightly below the usual stats compared to the Diamond Cap, it's got a solid crit damage bonus.

I actually got a bit of a confusion here, thinking the branches to the north were backtracking to the lower level rather than the path forward. It's the path forward.

Long story short, this happened and I'm a buffoon.

So we fight an Unrooted as well. It's got Takeover and Hydro Spike but is otherwise the same as the other interior enemies.

There's also Root Munchers outside. They got Chomp, Rabies, and Adrenaline, and inflict Weakness with all hits. So yeah thats fun.

I dunno what I was worried about! It's clearly not the same as the branches below.

And we're back in the sidescroller. I dunno, wood carved sigils aren't enough scenery for me!

Ah, out of the sidescrolling at last. The interior here is where owl/salmon stops being a friendly suggestion for Quintarless sorts.

See, what they now want you to do is do funny glidehops from treetop to treetop, except they're not always treetops! Oh no they are not!

Here's the start point, and a great endgame axe for a Nomad. In exchange for a slight power drop compared to the Diamond Axe, this sucker starts you off with maxed AP AND a durationless Frenzy buff. Sure, I've gone over how durationless buffs are great up until the bearer bites it, but honestly? Considering how little you have to give up for it and how valuable that is to a Nomad, that's not bad! Hold this thing, GUTS.

YEAH! You seeing this? Make it frame perfect or go to hell!

Oh, 36 AP, right I gonna unequip Adrenaline. Anyway, Rotten Root. Body Slam, Earthquake, and Waste Away. And the same Water and healing vulnerabilities as the other treebeasts.

Anyway, same basic idea as before, just a bit more 3D than usual.

Gotta hit the torch.

And follow the not so subtle wood carving.

Careful, you only got a single tile to work with there.

That's really about it though.

Let's just go ahead and claim the highest home point in Sequoia. Yes, even higher than Callisto Shrine.

And then glide down to this box I forgor.

Ideal dagger for a tanking Ninja, this.

And there's our destination. Through there, the final boss of the Sequoia awaits.

Pop on back to the overworld for this real quick.

Statwise, Spirit Cage is pretty reasonable. Absorbs Fire damage which is annoying, but their own moveset is pretty sparse! Rally Call, Shroomy Leer, and Raise Dead, that's it! They rely solely on Shroomy Gaze and basic attacks to beat you! Oh, and the Unrooted and Shaken Root they resurrect at the start of the fight, those too. So this is, in essence, a summoning boss. Defeating a single Unrooted or Shaken Root isn't too hard if your build is endgame capable like ours is, but they're beefy enough to be solo encounters throughout the Sequoia, so having a constant stream of them with Power and Armor Up buffs can get a little overwhelming! Area attacks certainly help of course, with this being a rare fight where Wave Armor and Drown are workable options on their own, or you can spike 'em down in your preferred method. There is a little bit of the tricky nuance to them if you can keep dropping them, mind you. First off, every time they die, they lose their Sleep immunity, so any inflictions of that can buy you time to go ham on the Spirit Cage. Second, you can revive enemies! Raise Dead is only used if both the Unrooted and the Shaken Root are down, and it's a full heal revive. Your own revives are probably not that potent, instead being mere scalars or even fixed values off of Chemist or Monk. The upshot of this is that if you want to buy yourself more downtime, you can revive the boss' guys to keep them from using Raise Dead, then bop 'em when the coast is clear. Rinse and repeat for free equilibrium! I chose not to do that, but it's a method!

Gungnir is awesome, by the way. Getting free Armor Down on hit for 2 turns is obscene, especially when you give it to someone who can counter.

Anyway, if you had cash concerns before this fight, now you don't. The Hand of Midas, in addition to a comfy 20 Luck and 10 Agility, also gives a 2.5 multiplier to cash winnings from fights.

And here we are! Top of the Sequoia, highest point in the land, so high up we can't see anything but the revelations of Dr. Coomer.

Now, I've been talking up how high we are, but let's put that into perspective.

The ground does not come into view after gliding to THE CUBE for a good 8 or so seconds. Not landing on it, just being able to see it.

The Sequoia was really short, so let's also do this thing real quick.

Sure we can do a little offering. He only accepts Deity Eyes, of course.

I offered what you wanted, why you heff to be mad?

This fight is gonna take some doing, but first things first: drink this image in, before even touching the video.

Gabriel is an enemy that has few tricks beyond overwhelming stat advantage, but those tricks are noteworthy. First off is that he always opens the fight with Mindless Attack, permanently applying Confusion to himself. If you want to draw Threat, you need to clear a debuff from him. Second is that he has ridiculously high damage output from two of his attacks, Brutal Venom and Star Flare, enough so that basically only a dedicated tank will be able to handle a hit from him safely, and you can't ensure a dedicated tank can do it without pulling the same cheese we did with the Devourer or clearing that Confusion. So what you really want is either enough defense/control to ensure everyone can take at least one hit, or quick responses to spike damage, like Reflection, or a good chunk of the Chivalry moveset. Aside from that, his only other trick is Chaos Roulette, which does 25% of everyone's current HP and applies a random, durationless debuff. This is actually much nicer than it sounds, because odds are by now that your status clearer (and at this stage you should have one) has a Ribbon, and anything the rest of your team's been hit with isn't gonna be a game-ender. Yeah, you might get one or two of your pals rendered inactionable, but at most that's just a turn they'd probably lose to healing raw damage from one of Gabriel's other attacks, so it's fiiiine.

Wooooooo! ...Now what? All we got from that was a Dark Seed, along with a warning to please not plant it in the capital garden.

NAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
      • Obtain the Skeleton Key.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
    • Defeat Anubis.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
      • Defeat Conscript.
      • Obtain STEM WARD.
    • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
      • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
  • Explore Beaurior Volcano.
    • Explore Beaurior Rock.
      • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
      • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
    • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
    • Find the Valkyrie class.
  • Explore the Open Sea.
    • Explore the Sequoia.
      • Defeat Spirit Cage.
    • Explore the Deep Sea.
      • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
      • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
      • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
      • Explore Neptune Shrine.
        • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
      • Explore the Depths.
        • Find the Cerulean Book.
        • Defeat the Old One.
        • Defeat the Peacekeeper.
        • Defeat the Devourer.
        • Defeat the Enforcer.
  • Explore the Chalice of Tar.
    • Find the Vermillion Book.
    • Find the White Crystal.
    • Find the Mimic class.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
  • Explore Jidamba Tangle.
    • Obtain the Europa Stone.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
    • Find the Foliage Key.
    • Find the Canopy Key.
    • Find the Cave Key.
    • Defeat Rexosaur.
    • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
      • Find the Viridian Book.
      • Find the Orchid Crystal.
      • Find the Weaver class.
      • Find the Salmon Violin.

 

[Kalir]

Hey remember when I said the Undersea Crabs are all the hell over the ocean and tracking them all down is super hard? I lied! Turns out all the crabs can be found over this small region south and southeast of Beaurior Volcano! Thanks, online maps! You help!

Or, if you prefer, north/northwest of the Quizard village under Land's End.

Two pretty clear landmarks around which every crab can be found.

I think this one is about as far east as they get.

As for the secret crab lair, that's just south of Seaside Cliffs, under the sandbar.

In what world would I ever decide not to do this?

YES! CRAB COALITION!

Now, I'm no monarchist, but I think this one might be on to something here.

Anyway, the Crab Claw is probably the best sword in the game for an Aegis or Valkyrie. I suppose you could use it on a Weaver too if you wanted. Longer buff duration has many uses.

Dunno if our corruption-borne seed has bloomed yet, don't wanna check it. To Castle Sequoia we go!

Unlike the storeroom we peeked into earlier and the entire rest of the castle, the foyer you enter into has no music.

Neither do the fights on this floor, which are there specifically to scare some wiseass who used the ibek and immediately tried to get in. Sentries alternate between two moves.

The first is Lockon, which applies the Lockon status. No duration, it's not a buff or debuff. The only way to clear it is death.

Sentries will always follow usages of Lockon with Precision Nuke.

It does exactly what it says on the box. Only works on targets with the Lockon status, of course.

And, of course, you can't actually reach the rest of the dungeon without owl. Gotta make this jump, after all.

Cuz if you don't, you can't reach this bridge! And this bridge goes to...

The actual dungeon! Wowowowowowow!

Castle Sequoia is a layered dungeon, similar to Ancient Labyrinth. Each floor is its own contained little puzzle of navigation. In this case, it's a lot like a more expanded version of Skumparadise's mushroom surfing.

The floor isn't just mushroom surfing, it's also got PAC-MAN warp tunnels! Each guarded by the one enemy formation this floor has, and it seems like that rule for "one formation per floor" remains static. I didn't investigate that hard though.

Bolten, Firen, and Spotlight. And Spotlight doesn't consume their turn. And they have Element Master for the hell of it.

The end of each floor is guarded by a rematch of a boss we've done before. I'll get to that after I loot the treasure.

Not that the treasure is hard to access, of course. The fixed size of the area plus the Treasure Finder almost guarantees that we can't miss it.

Parasite X has almost the exact same gameplan as the version we fought way back in Skumparadise. Shroomy Gaze is upgraded to Shroomy Leer (both for Parasite X and its summons), and Dream Feast is a new wrinkle for if we didn't think to bring an answer to Spore. But like... if you're this far and DON'T have an answer to your team getting hit with debuffs that prevent action? Straight up, that's a skill issue.

We get dumped immediately afterwards onto the next floor, which is a mushroom jumper floor.

Aside from the fact that the mushrooms are much larger, bouncier, and stationary, it's pretty much the exact same deal here. Rove around the floor using the warps to get to hidden areas, find cool treasures, then wrestle a boss rematch.

Not exaggerating. That's what we're looking at.

This floor has Watchmans! They can Absorb and cast Thunderbolt, and Activate in response to any physical damage. When activated, Absorb upgrades to Blood Suck, and they gain Doom Song to inflict Death Sentence.

Acting on the assumption that your dedicated support caster isn't gonna use their weapon to attack? Protector lets them apply Protect for free on basic hits! I don't know if that works with Aid weapons though. Still, if you're using something like Codex and want to still have a use for your basic attack, it's not bad.

I still haven't found these in the shop. I don't... know where you can get them repeatedly! Am I missing something trivial? The item merchant in Capital Sequoia doesn't sell them OR Zethers/Z-Potions! I must be missing something. Ah well, I've been pretty light on Chemist abuse this game anyway.

Woooo treasure!

Okay this actually is just the same boss fight again. Only thing that seems new is that Neo Warden has double debuff duration. Which, yeah, that sucks, but it also only works when Neo Warden gets below half HP, and by this stage, we have SO MANY WAYS to absolutely invalidate a physical area attacker that only does physical area attacks. Like, I don't even think I'm using the best team for that by a long shot! I was spamming Power Break and Steeling Wind and just throwing no-sells every so often. Cool?

This floor changes the music over to the Sequoia Athenaeum theme, because guess what, ice block puzzles NOW WITH TAR!

The goal for these, both for the treasure and progress, is to line up ice blocks within these little divots. You can then platform across them to get to the goodies if you go this way, or the boss if you do the other one.

The ice can slide through the tar without issue, so rule of thumb is that those little holes are where you can and should try to slide an ice.

Better yet, tar slows down the ice considerably, so you can hop aboard and surf the ice you push. Golden Quintar makes it easier, but even an owl can pull it off.

The ice block we pushed first has gently nestled south of this other one, allowing us to push it north for the boss route.

Ice Munchers! They aren't too bad: Icy Chill, Nut Gobble and Hibernate are the usual things, while they also have a Frost Bite that ignores Defense and inflicts, you guessed it, Frostbite. Absorbs Ice damage but is weak to Fire. Shouldn't pose any serious threat to any wide scale attacker worth their salt.

To reach the boss path, you gotta set a block down here first. Shouldn't be too hard. The last one here will be surfed on to reach the center of the map.

Don't do this though. You don't have enough blocks to do both paths like I am clearly trying to do here. If you want this route that badly, use the first block we already pushed north, so you can save the block I am currently wasting to surf to the center.

Otherwise this happens!

There's a few reset switches throughout, thankfully.

Yeah, no matter which path you're doing, you need to get here at some point. It's only realistically accessible by surfing the cube, although I think? a Golden Quintar can get by without.

You only need one block here. If you're doing the boss route, push the block up here. If you want the treasure, push the other block east to finish up the path.

Pushing both, absent a Golden Quintar, robs you of an escape route, forcing a reset.

Even with a Golden Quintar, you stand a good chance of bumping this block on approach, ruining whatever you just did.

Okay here we go. Get this block up here, using the block north of it as a brake.

That'll do the trick! The block on the west side plus one from the center island gets us our path here.

Two handy-dandy defensive specialized weapons here. The King's Guard is a sword whose only feature is applying Power Down for a turn on hit, not unlike the spear Meena's currently rocking. As such, it's a really strong pick for a counter-focused tank.

Despite how it seems, the Royal Guard spear isn't exactly built for a tank. I'd actually call it an ideal weapon for a Beatsmith focused on raw offense. Remember, with characters that haven't specced for defensive stats, many late/postgame fights effectively can oneshot them with anything they want. Royal Guard buys spear-wielding attackers that extra layer of survivability that their statline can't, and Beatsmith is the most standout example of spear users that fit the bill. Valkyries (and with the mod, Monks) already have no trouble weathering offensives.

Yeah here's how owl players have to get off the island.

Yeah this is the next refight. Weird choice but okay. Akamanto's attacks are now Bolten and Cold Embrace, but it retains the strat of Utsusemi and Death Sentence, both tricks with plenty of workaround. Hell, I bruteforced past Utsusemi with decent success given that I've had to give GUTS and Werdna ample amounts of accuracy boosting equipment.

Next part, back to the usual castle music. Here, the challenge of the day is a redo of Jidamba Eaclaneya, save that the salmon are now the rare obsidian variant as seen in beloved game Terraria, and instead of water you have lava. Don't mess up, and don't think too hard about convection.

And if you thought Jidamba Eaclaneya's time limits for the mounts were strict, HAH! TWO SECONDS GO!!! I ALREADY LOST!

Yo do you like equipment so good it can be the cornerstone of an entire strategy? Dream Hunter is not only a really strong bow in its own right, it also deals double damage to sleeping targets without waking them up. I've never seen an ability hit five digits of damage, but if I had to guess I'd say an En-Water Snipe on a sleeping target with this thing could pull it off.

Again, you have like zero let with the obsidian salmon. You will frequently end up dismounting and losing momentum directly as you jump over the platform you need to land on.

This one's much more straightforward than the previous floor. No cerebral plotting of what piece goes where, it's all pure reflex and practice.

Very mundane scene.

Okay this is getting a little silly now.

GOOD ENOUGH

A rapier for all you Hawk Stance Fencers out there.

The fights on this floor are pretty fierce. Cauterizer and Spit Fire, exactly two moves. Very fast, but weak to Water and Ice.

The hole up north is the path to the final floor of Castle Sequoia, and it's a pretty tight fit given the lava. But treasure first, obviously.

The short times combined with the tight maneuvering make this tricky, but don't give up, skeleton

This is a weird one. It's good, don't get me wrong, but it's also a sword you basically have to use on someone working with a Wizard teammate for full effectiveness. Maybe if you adamantly swore by Sword Cleric from that one suggestion Asema and I made super early in the game you could do some obscene spike damage by stacking this, Spotlight, and Resist Down.

Anyway, no more minibosses! Just redoing certain stages! It's back to Slip Glide Ride for us!

Chomp, Devour, and Death Gaze, which inflicts a single turn Death Sentence. Kinda rude actually.

Speaking of rude, this jump is REALLY tight. You gotta be on the mushroom platform to jump up, and yet maneuver over to the hole within the time of your lightning quick ascent. And this is apparently our second Paladin Wand! Wild!

This jump is almost as mean and it's required!

That's about it though. It's not hard with owl, and really not hard with Golden Quintar.

And that's it! This elevator will lift us to the very very top of the castle.

I'm not gonna screenshot each floor, but it goes straight up the center to the throne room.

And it's here! Up on the roof of the castle. No ceilings, royalty don't need no ceilings.

Seriously, we're just up here.

Huh, nobody home. Figured the Grand Master would be here at the least.

That's... unusual. But it's also the only way to go forward we have now.

With the Mars Stone we could theoretically sequence break our way to the Mars Shrine without it. We've never seen anywhere that could conceivably take us to wherever the New World Shrine is.

That's the map done!

So let's go off the grid.

Here we are. The New World, at its Shrine.

We must be far underground by now. Magma and giant mushrooms are the only natural features here.

Wait... what?

What in the goddamn?!

No map, only questions. How in the hell does Astley have dominion here? Where even IS here?!

Let's raise more questions for the next, final update! Gimme dem plants!

This is the mushroom. Spore, Thunder, and Storm Stance. Pretty simple, but very VERY worth fighting.

Spore Shooter isn't as nice as Dream Hunter, but it does come with free Sleep on some hits, which can be nice. I don't like the chance-based infliction of a once-per-fight infliction, though.

The Fetish Seed produces whatever this is! Thunderbolt and Epidemic as the attacks, Stone Layer and Scale Layer as self-buffs that provides Defense/Resistance of 9999 for 3 relevant hits. So either bring buff-canceling, lots of hits, or just kill the Wai-Fu before she uses those moves.

We're a bit too late in the game for the Cosplay Garb to be useful, and I don't know if the scaling max MP boost comes with MP during the fight, so it feels kinda weak. But it could be worse!

The last plant, made from the seed from Gabriel, results in this. The Particular Ore has no attacks and skips every turn.

The Old World, huh?

Oh. Oh no. This isn't a safe place.

We got to take this down, but we'll wait until we finish exploring The New World first. You'll see why next time.

TO DO:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
      • Obtain the New World Stone.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
  • Obtain the Old World Stone.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
      • Obtain the Skeleton Key.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
    • Defeat Anubis.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
      • Defeat Conscript.
      • Obtain STEM WARD.
    • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
      • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
  • Explore Beaurior Volcano.
    • Explore Beaurior Rock.
      • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
      • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
    • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
    • Find the Valkyrie class.
  • Explore the Open Sea.
    • Explore the Sequoia.
      • Defeat Spirit Cage.
    • Explore the Deep Sea.
      • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
      • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
      • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
      • Explore Neptune Shrine.
        • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
      • Explore the Depths.
        • Find the Cerulean Book.
        • Defeat the Old One.
        • Defeat the Peacekeeper.
        • Defeat the Devourer.
        • Defeat the Enforcer.
  • Explore the Chalice of Tar.
    • Find the Vermillion Book.
    • Find the White Crystal.
    • Find the Mimic class.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
  • Explore Jidamba Tangle.
    • Obtain the Europa Stone.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
    • Find the Foliage Key.
    • Find the Canopy Key.
    • Find the Cave Key.
    • Defeat Rexosaur.
    • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
      • Find the Viridian Book.
      • Find the Orchid Crystal.
      • Find the Weaver class.
      • Find the Salmon Violin.
• Explore the New World.
• Explore the Old World.

 

[Torzelbaum]

This floor has Watchmans!

But who watches them?

 

[Kalir]

Today is the finalest of final updates for this game. We'll knock out both endings (this game has two endings) and then it will be over and it will be a great tragedy but make for fun memories.

The New World has one location of interest that isn't the final encounter. I don't know if any other keys work, but hey, we have the Skeleton Key. May as well.

Discipline Hollow is a boss rush area! It lets you refight any boss you've encountered, either individually or as a full marathon. Good luck with that, of course. I've never been much of one for boss rushes, but I want to highlight it anyway.

In the highly likely event that you haven't fought every boss, they will be omitted from the rush.

Anyway, there's a lot of area you can map down here, but as the bulk of it is magma pools, you're better off sticking to dry land and heading north first.

There are Flames down here, but fighting them is usually a bad idea. But unless you play it stealthy, a fight will be unavoidable and unrewarding.

Every fight in the New World will be against one or more likely two enemies that cast a self-destruct move on their first action and are primed to go first. They suck and they don't even drop cash.

Hope you like reviving after every fight.

The springy shrooms at least make navigation pretty easy, and if you see the flames beforehand you can just go the long way around them if you don't want to futz with stealth.

If you're curious, the cavern IS sealed off completely from the rest of Sequoia.

There aren't many treasures down here but there are a couple.

Another caster dagger for the pile. This one gives max MP, six turns of Magic Up, and a bit of CT reduction for the hell of it. Certainly worth consideration.

Cool. Compelling and riveting gameplay.

You know you're nearing the end when you get to the evil edgy castle.

May as well go up to the keep now, right?

Foreboding,

There are only two features worth mentioning in the courtyard, if that. The first is the shed with the map...

And the second is a cactus farm. Not that people need to eat in this game, but it's still the only stuff worth highlighting. Has a very "my first Minecraft base" vibe going on.

Well this is pretty unambiguous.

Anyway excuse me while I hurl myself into magma repeatedly for mapping's sake.

Pretty sure that's the only remaining treasure in here.

The treasures are both guarded by Death Spears, which have multitarget Explode.

Good thing Francis is indestructible.

Imagine trying to get through this maze without facetanking the Death Spear. Couldn't be me.

Lunar Mail boosts healing the wearer receives and that's nice. It's otherwise very standard lategame heavy armor.

Anyway, fifteen or so minutes later and the New World is fully mapped and looted. Only had to throw myself into the magma about fifty times.

All that remains is getting some answers.

From the Grand Master herself... Astley.

What.

<Reid> You know, I had a feeling from the start that Astley was the Grand Master. Didn't bother me though.
<Chloe> I was pretty surprised to hear she was just bitching about her own stupid rules.
<Talon> But she promised we'd get a real fight. And it looks like that's you.
<Astley> Let's find out if you're the adventurer I've been looking for!

Chat what the hell is this.

Like, okay. First of all, let's set aside the fact that Astley was apparently the Grand Master the entire damn time despite being a meager level 10 Fencer to start off. Set aside the fact that none of her companions that she naturally formed a party with as friends were aware of this or expressed more surprise than "haha you made bad rules and then were mad about them". What, exactly, was Astley's gameplan here?

As the Grand Master, Astley instated no projects in the vein of previous Grand Masters. Her only policies were to raise the crystal requirements for certain progression elements, a choice which was met with immediate and strong disapproval from the entire community of Sequoia. In response to this, she started Banishing basically everyone who wasn't aggressively seeking out crystals, accusing them of, effectively, not playing the game right. And yet, while she was doing this, she was ALSO masquerading as a determined adventurer just as new to the world as we are, and just as upset as the other players in the game over the harshness of her own rule. It certainly fomented a desire to hunt down the Grand Master and take control of Sequoia by force, true, but for most players, that kind of grand gesture just was not in their playbook. Most people, faced with that kind of oppressive, controlling politics in a video game of all things will simply get what they can out of it and take the Banish when it comes. You can see it with Quinsey and Sven Everwinter: absent the friends of whatever quality they made in their time here, they found little to no reason to stay.

Her actions paint her as someone who wants nothing to do with the position of Grand Master and wants to pass the title on to someone who understands the spirit of adventure, which isn't hard if you're the kind of person to beat Crystal Project. But the methodology is just so bass-ackwards and leaves whoever would take that position (i.e. you the person playing Crystal Project) running the scattered remnants of a ghost server. Further, it's incredibly baffling that the people who are nominally on her side to the point of "we'll take down the Grand Master or get Banished trying" were just... okay with this outcome! I really don't see why at the very least Talon, for example, wouldn't have tried to take her down and become Grand Master himself. Or why Chloe is on board with this when it's directly opposed to her extremely "lo-fi hip hop birds to fish for" lifestyle.

In fact, I'm going to say it. This ending? This is some Golden Sun tier writing.

But anyway, here's the fight. And also the credits and ending if you want.

Astley's team comp is not exactly the strongest you could find in the game. Even Dr. Cool Aids' team had a degree of synergy to their builds, but this is basically just four physical damage dealers with a few of them desperately pretending they have other class roles. Astley plays the Fencer role hard with Snowfang, Checkmate, Nighthawk, and Swallowtail. Reid runs Warrior/Aegis with Bruiser Crush, Defender, and Cover (always used on Astley). Talon plays a very passive Rogue run with Shadow Cut and Rupture, and uses Utsusemi to pretend like he's still playing by the rules of Threat. Chloe has Take Aim and Quickshot but usually prefers to run Mixed Magic to support the team, which isn't the worst build I've ever heard of. But again... four physical attackers, and not even especially dangerous ones. Even a team not yet to level cap should be able to handle this one.

In any case, Astley has no words for us after her defeat.

Reid moves to say something, but before he can speak, the Banishing that awaits a defeated Grand Master kicks in.

This really sucks for you all, and I don't know how much Astley considered how much her very real friendship with everyone mattered.

Reid disappears as well, although whether that's a Banish or him just giving up on Sequoia like so many others is unknown.

Talon follows suit shortly after...

And Chloe doesn't say another word, leaving us alone in Sequoia's hidden depths.

I can't be happy about this! Not with this much deception in play!

In any case, the credits roll, and we have won the regular ending of Crystal Project.

This puts us back in Spawning Meadow, where we can talk to Nan to do the new game plus stuff if we really want to. I don't right now though, so let's go get the super secret ending.

Which means we have to take on the final challenge, the source of the errant corruption left over from a previous Grand Master's failures...

Periculum.

This is the hardest boss in all of Crystal Project, only accessible after defeating Gabriel, and it packs a slew of tricks and stats befitting of such a challenge. It packs attacks both physical (Division Cut and Pain Spreader) and magical (Fireblast, Dark Overture, and MP Sickle), and unless you are running a defensive powerhouse or checking its offensive with buffs and debuffs, expect those moves to deal oneshot damage. Adding to the threat are Periculum's three stances, which it cycles through every few turns. Stone Stance halves physical damage it would take, Mist Stance dodges all magic, and Hazard Stance responds to any damage it would take with Counter Kill, effectively a Devour reskin with a bit of an Accuracy hit.

In order to defeat Periculum, in addition to the usual level, gear, and moves that constitute a postgame plan, you will also need to have enough variation in your offense to handle the three stances. Mixing physical and magical damage options on everyone is a good idea, or at the very least giving physical/magical characters things to do when they can't use their favored mode of attack. Ignoring counters or guaranteeing physical dodges also helps when Hazard Stance is on deck, although in my experience Periculum never stays in that stance for long. That aside though, this really is just a full test of everything you have learned and practiced when it comes to the combat of Crystal Project.

By defeating Periculum, we get the Proof of Merit, which we can show to Astley to get the true ending.

So let's go do that. Image unrelated, where I've proven that I've found every boss fight worth showing off, thus making this the most complete run and LP of Crystal Project I've ever done (despite missing whatever item shop sells Fenix Syrup somewhere).

Your plan still sucks but let's show off that we get the spirit of things.

This world was made for adventurers like you. I've been waiting a long time for someone who understands what adventure truly is. And now that you're here... Well, it looks like we have no need to hold back! I hope you're ready for your true last battle!

If you say so.

This fight isn't too different from the base version. Same moveset for everyone with higher stats, for the most part. Astley has two major differences setting her apart for this one, though. The first is that she is immune to any status effect that would prevent her from taking actions. No Sleep, Stun, or Stop. The second is that she can Banish your characters. At certain HP thresholds, she will use Banish as her action to remove whoever she targets from the fight for its remainder. They cannot act, be targeted, or return to play. They simply cease to be. Fortunately, this doesn't extend to outside the fight as one would almost certainly expect it to, but during the fight it's still a massive loss of momentum that can quickly spiral out of control. Outside of spiking her down from nearly-full to dead before she takes a turn, there is no way to prevent a Banish from occurring, nor a way to avoid or negate it. If Astley's got low enough health and a Banish in the tank, she's using it and you're losing a party member.

It means so much to me that it's out there, and that you have it. I hope you'll always continue to fuel that spark. Never let it die.

Setting aside my issues with the story that got us to this point... I do really like the true ending here, if only because the message here feels very heartfelt, from the creator of this game expecting only the most dedicated of explorers to get here.

They made a massive world and gave you all sorts of ways to explore it, and then said "go for it" and turned us loose.

And we did! We explored everywhere there was to explore, fought everything that could be fought, and not out of any sense of obligation (well, maybe a bit for running this LP for y'all), but simply because it was there and it was fun.

And do you really need more of a reason than that?

Is that not the entire reason we are all here playing video games to begin with?

After being through so much, we may find ourselves reflecting on our past actions and experiences. Do you see any regrets? Fret not, for we all do. Otherwise, how would we grow? Regardless, to do everything over can be a strong desire. For you, this desire may become reality, if you so choose.

Speaking of, maybe you're not done with Crystal Project! Maybe you want to do another run, without Quintar racing or something!

We gotchu.

Crystal Project has a terrifying amount of ways to NG+ your run, even without mods. I won't go into the details of everything here, but I will share my usual preferences on any given section. For here, I like to keep either maps or revealed areas but not both, as well as both the Hatchery (has my Golden Quintar after all) and Archive.

These I usually leave entirely alone, but hey, they're there if you want to do challenge runs. Game Mode comes in Standard, Vanilla (early patches of Crystal Project) and Chaos (superdeath kill you mode).

And, finally, there's a randomizer. If I fiddle with anything in the randomizer, it's usually just classes and equipment. Most things you could randomize have some individual tweaks, like whether you want to scale the stuff you're changing to be region-appropriate or you feel like making the flames in Spawning Meadows into Death Spears or something.

But in my opinion? ALWAYS turn this option on. Yeah you run the risk of getting an early Summoner or Samurai, but who cares? This lets you explore unconventional class combos you might not have considered at first! Do it.

And that's it. That's all the Crystal Project I can LP for you! I hope you enjoyed my journey through the land of Sequoia, whether you were just here to watch or are planning on exploring it yourself. Thanks for stopping by.

DONE:

Spoiler

• Build the perfect starting team.
• Explore Spawning Meadows.
  • Prove the existence of black squirrels.
  • Try to find another route out of Spawning Meadows.
• Explore Delende.
  • Cross the bridge to the Proving Meadows.
  • Explore the Fish Hatchery.
  • Explore the Pale Grotto.
    • Defeat Guardian.
    • Find the Slate Crystal.
    • Find the Fencer class.
  • Explore the Soiled Den.
    • Defeat Bone Thief.
    • Trade an Earth Bangle to Huntie.
  • Explore the Basement of the Cabin on the Cliff.
    • Defeat Gran.
  • Find the dogs' bones.
  • Explore Lake Delende.
  • Defeat Troll.
• Explore Seaside Cliffs.
  • Trade 13 Clamshells to Manana Man.
  • Find a rare monster that drops an Earth Bangle.
  • Explore Draft Shaft Conduit.
    • Defeat Canal Beast.
    • Find the Violet Crystal.
    • Find the Shaman class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Shaman.
• Explore Proving Meadows.
  • Find three crystals.
  • Defeat Knight.
  • Explore the Trial Caves.
    • Find the Yellow Crystal.
    • Find the Aegis class.
    • Explore Skumparadise.
      • Defeat Parasite.
• Explore Yamagawa M.A.
  • Defeat Sepulchra.
  • Find the Aquamarine Crystal.
  • Find the Scholar class.
    • Find every Monster Magic spell.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Scholar.
• Explore the Capital Courtyard.
  • Find the Courtyard Key.
  • Defeat Enami.
• Explore Capital Sequoia.
  • Find all the penguins.
  • Find all the Craftwork gear.
    • Upgrade all the Craftwork gear to Silver gear.
      • Upgrade all the Silver gear to Gold gear.
        • Upgrade all the Gold gear to Diamond gear.
  • Obtain the Gaea Stone.
  • Clear the hedge maze of Improper Imps.
  • Find a way past the hedge maze.
    • Either defeat or circumvent Orchard and Little H.
    • Explore Castle Sequoia.
      • Explore the Castle Ramparts.
        • Find the Ramparts Key.
        • Defeat Murasaki.
        • Defeat Masashi.
        • Defeat the Ramparts Demon.
        • Find the Orange Crystal.
        • Find the Beastmaster class.
      • Obtain the New World Stone.
  • Enter the Luxury shop.
    • Find sixteen crystals to expand the Luxury shop stock.
  • Get past the guard on the west gate.
  • Defeat all the training dummies.
    • Defeat the Level ?? Dummy.
  • Find three Digested Heads for Sam the Sadist.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warrior.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Monk.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Rogue.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Wizard.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Cleric.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Warlock.
  • Find the Chartreuse Crystal.
  • Find the Beatsmith class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beatsmith.
  • Explore Jojo Sewers.
    • Explore the Boomer Society.
    • Trade a Crag Demon Horn to Marlin.
    • Explore Capital Jail.
      • Defeat Warden.
      • Find the Crimson Crystal.
      • Find the Reaper class.
  • Obtain the Old World Stone.
• Explore the Rolling Quintar Fields.
  • Meet the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fiendish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Brutish Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Fancy Quintar Eye.
    • Show the Quintar Enthusiast a Trusty or Woke Quintar Eye.
      • Defeat the Quintar Enthusiast.
    • Obtain a Quintar Pass.
    • Obtain the Quintar Flute.
  • Explore Quintar Nest.
    • Find the Olive Crystal.
    • Find the Hunter class.
  • Explore Quintar Sanctum.
    • Find the Violet Red Crystal.
    • Find the Chemist class.
    • Defeat the Fancy Quintar.
• Explore Cobblestone Crag.
  • Defeat the Crag Demon.
• Explore Okimoto N.S.
  • Defeat Kuromanto.
  • Find the Shadow Crystal.
  • Find the Ninja class.
• Explore Shoudu Province.
  • Obtain the Mars Stone.
  • Explore the Undercity.
    • Defeat the Shadow Master.
    • Defeat the Blade Master.
    • Defeat the Duel Master.
    • Find the Silver Crystal.
    • Find the Assassin class.
  • Repair the elevator.
    • Win the Sky Arena.
    • Find the Sienna Crystal.
    • Find the Samurai class.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Samurai.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Assassin.
  • Explore Ganymede Shrine.
    • Obtain the Ganymede Stone.
  • Explore Flyer's Crag.
• Explore the Quintar Reserve.
  • Explore the Quintar Mausoleum.
    • Learn how to speak Quintar.
  • Explore Dione Shrine.
    • Obtain the Dione Stone.
    • Breed a Golden Quintar.
    • Explore Flyer's Lookout.
• Explore Eastern Chasm.
  • Defeat Undergrowth.
• Explore Greenshire Reprise.
• Explore Tall, Tall Heights.
  • Get Hector an ice block.
  • Obtain the Triton Stone.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Chemist.
  • Return the library books to the Sequoia Athenaeum.
    • Explore the Sequoia Athenaeum.
      • Obtain the Skeleton Key.
  • Explore the Northern Cave.
    • Explore Slip Glide Ride.
      • Defeat Red Guardian.
      • Find the Almond Crystal.
      • Find the Summoner class.
        • Challenge the Deity of Fire.
        • Challenge the Deity of Wind.
        • Challenge the Deity of Earth.
        • Challenge the Deity of Darkness.
        • Challenge the Deity of Ice.
        • Challenge the Deity of Thunder.
        • Challenge the Deity of Reflection.
        • Challenge the Deity of Life.
        • Challenge the Deity of the Deep.
  • Defeat Hermetic.
  • Explore Land's End.
    • Defeat The Owlbear.
    • Obtain the Callisto Stone.
    • Obtain the Owl Drum.
• Explore Salmon Pass.
  • Explore Salmon River.
    • Win the Salmon Sprint.
      • Obtain the Salmon Cello.
    • Explore River Cat's Ego.
      • Find the Goldenrod Crystal.
      • Find the Nomad class.
  • Explore Salmon Bay.
• Explore Mercury Shrine.
  • Obtain the Mercury Stone.
• Explore Poseidon Shrine.
  • Obtain the Poseidon Stone.
• Explore the Overpass.
  • Find enough Overpass Scraps for a map.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Fencer.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Aegis.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Hunter.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Reaper.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Nomad.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Valkyrie.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Summoner.
  • Prove our skill to the Master Beastmaster.
• Explore the Underpass.
  • Find enough Underpass Scraps for a map.
  • Explore Capital Pipeline.
  • Explore Jade Cavern.
• Explore Poko Poko Desert.
  • Find the three lookout towers.
  • Find the terrible mom's son.
  • Explore Ancient Reservoir.
    • Find the Pale Rose Crystal.
    • Find the Dervish class.
    • Defeat Possessor.
    • Obtain the Ibek Bell.
  • Explore the Ancient Labyrinth.
    • Defeat Anubis.
• Explore Sara Sara Bazaar.
  • Bring the food enthusiast some Shoudu Stew.
  • Obtain a Ferry Pass.
  • Find the Tram Key.
    • Explore the Continental Tram.
      • Defeat Conscript.
      • Obtain STEM WARD.
    • Explore Sara Sara Beach.
      • Prove our skill to the Master Dervish.
  • Explore Beaurior Volcano.
    • Explore Beaurior Rock.
      • Defeat the Ancient Sword.
      • Defeat Iguanadon and Iguanadin.
    • Find the Deep Sky Crystal.
    • Find the Valkyrie class.
  • Explore the Open Sea.
    • Explore the Sequoia.
      • Defeat Spirit Cage.
    • Explore the Deep Sea.
      • Find enough Deep Sea Scraps for a map.
      • Find all the Undersea Crabs.
      • Obtain the Treasure Finder from the Quizards.
      • Explore Neptune Shrine.
        • Obtain the Neptune Stone.
      • Explore the Depths.
        • Find the Cerulean Book.
        • Defeat the Old One.
        • Defeat the Peacekeeper.
        • Defeat the Devourer.
        • Defeat the Enforcer.
  • Explore the Chalice of Tar.
    • Find the Vermillion Book.
    • Find the White Crystal.
    • Find the Mimic class.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Mimic.
  • Explore Jidamba Tangle.
    • Obtain the Europa Stone.
    • Prove our skill to the Master Weaver.
    • Find the Foliage Key.
    • Find the Canopy Key.
    • Find the Cave Key.
    • Defeat Rexosaur.
    • Explore Jidamba Eaclaneya.
      • Find the Viridian Book.
      • Find the Orchid Crystal.
      • Find the Weaver class.
      • Find the Salmon Violin.
• Explore the New World.
  • Defeat Astley's party.
  • Show Astley the Proof of Merit.
• Explore the Old World.
  • Defeat Periculum.

 

[Torzelbaum]

And that's it. That's all the Crystal Project I can LP for you!

Thanks.

I hope you enjoyed my journey through the land of Sequoia, whether you were just here to watch or are planning on exploring it yourself.

I did. I was mostly just watching but had heard about the game so was curious about exploring it myself. After seeing this LP I don't think I will but I still enjoyed observing your adventure.

Thanks for stopping by.

You're welcome.

 

[Mogri]

The endgame rabbit hole runs deep in this game. Thanks for showing it off!

What was your final loadout?

 

[Kalir]

GUTS has a very simple gameplan: stance up with whatever fits their situation best (En-Water if nothing else comes to mind) and then use the Battle Skill moveset to hit for big ugly spike damage. Power Break if the boss is especially scary and Frieren hasn't already stuffed their physical offensive. In the unlikely event he's out of AP, Attack Focus and Fury keeps his tempo going with minimal downtime.

Werdna runs the Reaper/Wizard combo that's won my heart ever since the first time I cleared the Sky Arena with it. This is an all-out offense combo that can flex between magic and physical damage with ease, although physical is usually preferred. Storm Stance plus the Demon Helm allows him to take hits with a degree of safety, and Arctic Chill opens up the possibility of Frostbite cheese combined with Frieren.

Frieren is the supporting core of the team. Codex and Summoner's own stats gives her enough MP that even the penalty of the Pointy Hat barely registers, allowing her Summons to tag enemies for an extra turn of debuff. When not summoning, her usual gameplan is using Mixed Magic for highly efficient spot treatment of her team or chipping in with lightweight damage and buffs.

Meena's best contribution to the team is refusing to die. The combination of Martial Arts and Valhalla as movesets allows her to keep up support to the team while keeping her alive and countering as much as possible. Revive allows her to get Frieren back up if she drops quickly, and her healing is a little better for partywide purposes but more limited due to her weak MP. Gungnir also adds free Armor Down on every counter!

 

[Mogri]

Good stuff. Thanks!

 

[Paul le Fou]

Having beaten this a bit ago, I'm finally catching up!

I never found Mercury Shrine, wtf D:

I'm only on page 2 now, which is where you start really getting sicko mode with your classes. Warrior/Scholar shocked me enough, but then changing your caster to a reaper! What! I also never even used the chemist, so I didn't realize how they had unique moves that used multiple items, or used them differently than usual. Neat.

I know you like Scythe reaper, but you found a lifesteal sword right after getting a reaper, and (while not that sword - I dunno if you found Bloodbind yet) I used a lifesteal-sword reaper for a looooong time and it's sooooo good. You don't need the scythe's lifesteal moves when you have lifesteal on everything (and the powerful warrior moveset to back it up)! But I did use a scythe reaper lategame and they're still pretty rad, it's true.

Nomad is another class I never really used, so I'm excited to see what you do with it.

These comments are drastically outdated but this LP is also Very Long so I'm gettin' there.