Insane Difficulty: Character/Job Party Recommendations - Insane Difficulty

Sikker, on 26 September 2015 - 12:20 PM, said:

depends on your play style and what you want – I can't stress this enough when people ask for advice. I for one hate character overlap and redundancy and try to avoid it all I can. If I have 3 characters I want them to be unique as possible and to have as little overlap as I can. I'd like for each of them to bring the best options they can based on the classes I know I want to use. Its really personal preference.

Oh I definitely hate overlap too but it seems inevitable in this patch. Even with that paladin/starlancer/hawk team you have two people with stat ups.

In my team the only overlap is heal light and saint saber. I don't mind having 2 healers at all and yeah it kinda sucks having 2 saint sabers instead of the elemental ones but honestly, most of the good teams I've seen have much more overlap then this. And I'm planning to mostly use moon saber anyway so it's not a huge deal.

To celebrate the game's 20th anniversary on September 30th, I started a new game. The party I chose was Lise, Hawk and Angela, though it took me long to decide between Angela and Carlie. I'd even like to start a parallel game with Carlie being the 3rd party member. Anyway, I reached the 1st class change, and everyone went Light. The final party will probably be Vanadis, Rogue and Archmage, but I could try Star Lancer, Wanderer and Grand Divina too. So many options.

BTW Hawk just learned Sleep Flower. Has anyone found any good strategies for that spell? It consumes plenty of MP, and the enemies wake up after a short time, or when they're hit by a physical attack.

If I start a game of Lise, Hawk and Carlie, which classes should I choose for them? Vanadis, Wanderer and Necromancer is a very tempting party, and Vanadis, Rogue and Evil Shaman is also a possibility. However, choosing Dark Carlie means you won't have a healer, unless you make Lise a Vanadis. Are there any good class combos featuring Lise, Hawk and Light Carlie?

Sefie1999AD, on 03 October 2015 - 01:25 PM, said:

You could try Star Lancer/Wanderer/Bishop or Sage

You swap out Hawk's debuffs for his wheelhouse of utility magic spells and Anti-Magic. If you make Carlie a Sage you get some pretty powerful MT Light Magic in addition to the elemental saber line or you could go the full healer route with Bishop and make use of her Turn Undead Spell.

If you can get by without anti-magic you could do Bishop/Night Blade/Star Lancer but the obvious deficit there is no Anti-magic – you have both debuffs/buffs/some status magic to even things out though.

I'd rather not go without Anti-Magic, as the item costs over 3000 in Byzel, and I like using it in regular fights against enemies that are immune to physical attacks, and I use Anti-Magic constantly to remove buffs from bosses like Dolan and Bigieu.

Star Lancer - Wanderer - Bishop/Sage could possibly work. How would you cope without stat-downs, though, would you be fine? Alternatively, you could replace Star Lancer with Dragon Master, but doing so will hurt your attack power.

One thing I like about Vanadis - Rogue - Archmage(/Evil Shaman) is the way the group is very easy to set up at the beginning of a battle. Lise casts MT Protect Up, Hawk casts MT Speed Up and Angela casts MT Power Down. After this, you'll take considerably less damage, cast spells faster and evade&land more attacks. If you want, you can follow up with another triple cast: Lise casts MT Power Up, Hawk casts Cutter Missile and Angela casts Aura Wave on Lise. Then you can just hack away with physical attacks and spells. This won't work with, say, Vanadis - Wanderer - Necromancer, since Lise needs to cast 3 stat-ups herself. Wanderer's Mind Up is hardly useful if you equip Necromancer with a Fireblaze, and I usually can't be bothered to apply 3 buffs with the same character. As an alternative, you could replace Rogue with Bishop or Light Duran, so you can start battles with Lise casting MT Speed Up, Angela casting MT Power Down and the third character casting MT Protect Up.

Sefie1999AD, on 04 October 2015 - 01:55 PM, said:

My play style relies on buffs or debuffs. I don't try to finagle both into it. I've been fine with my PTs when I only have one or the other. You dont need both ups and downs or more aptly put I don't need both. Yes they're handy, but I've had several PTs with one or the other and it works out fine. But you play differently than I do.

So I finally started a new game with a friend. We have Lise, Duran and Carlie, he's playing as Duran and wants to roll Paladin, so I'll choose the other two based on that. I'm thinking Starlancer and Necromancer, any suggestions?

Sounds good, and close to my first party on this hack. You'll have all stat-ups and stat-downs, Paladin provides healing and Anti-Magic, Star Lancer provides Aura Wave, Energy Ball and mass silence, and you'll also have Saint and Dark Sabers. You'll get access to six elements, plus Half Vanish and Turn Undead. The biggest weakness of the party is the general lack of MT elemental spells, as you have no sabers or MT spells for the basic 4 elements, so you'll be limited to Carlie's sniping.

Another party question: can you recommend any good defensive parties (i.e. groups that are very hard to kill)?

Sefie1999AD, on 12 October 2015 - 08:31 AM, said:

Lord/Sage/Fenrir Knight looks good defensively : You have def/speed/mind up and all stat downs, MT sleep and two healers. But it's severely lacking in magic damage options aside from Rainbow Dust, so you'd have to rely mostly on sabered physicals. But I think it'd be very hard to die, Fenrir Knight even has Transshape and Moon saber to top it off.
You could also swap Lord/Sage for Warrior Monk/Bishop.

Lord, Sage and Fenrir Knight sounds good otherwise, except it doesn't have Anti-Magic. In terms of defence, this means you won't be able to remove sabers, Power Up, Energy Ball or other buffs from enemies, which can hurt you against enemies like Swordmaster, Dark Lord, Dolan and Bigieu. Replacing Lord with Paladin would give up Speed Up for Anti-Magic, and also give you Saint Saber and Turn Undead.

Power Up can be removed with Power Down
the only thing for which you need anti-magic (defensively) is sabers and energy ball

I might go with Paladin Lord, Wanderer, Fenrir Knight as a start

short laundry list what defense options the "perfect defense" team would have:
heal light, preferably twice
moon saber
tinkle rain
def up
mind up or at least magic shield
speed up (evasion and cast speed)
life booster
transshape (immunity to normal attacks)
power down / jutsu / black curse
mind down / jutsu / black curse
speed down / jutsu / black curse
some form of mt sleep, body change
death spell / turn undead / stone cloud / Cold Blaze (if it doesn't move, it can't hurt back)
a way to inflict mute (no spells/techs = less hurt)
anti-magic

Can you think of situations where the Evil Shaman is a more suitable party member than the Archmage? They're two pretty similar classes, but the Archmage just seems to be superior:

Archmage
* 6 MT level 2 elemental spells
* Body Change
* Anti-Magic
* Mind Down and Power Down
* Aura Wave
* Rainbow Dust (MT level 3)

Evil Shaman
* 6 elemental spells (one MT level 1, five ST level 2, plus Ghost Road, which is MT level 1.5)
* Tinkle Rain
* Anti-Magic
* Demon Breath (MT level 1.5 and Mind Down) and Power Down
* Tinkle Rain
* Great Demon (ST level 2.5)

The biggest difference seems to be Body Change and Aura Wave vs. Tinkle Rain, and Archmage can do both AoE and sniping, while Evil Shaman focuses more on sniping.

Great Demon also means more damage even if there is no weakness to be exploited. I think this one can be chalked up to the classes performing the same role, but complementing different classes. No reason to bring Archmage if someone else already has Aura Wave. And maybe you're already using Angela or Carlie in a different class.

Is there any team that profits from having Death Hand instead of Duelist?
Any good parties for Dervish?

Any time I look at Kevin for a team I default to Heal-Bot with punches...

Death Hand: he's similar to Duelist, the major differences being that he gives up Leaf Saber, Anti-Magic and ST Aura Wave for double hits, wolf form, better Vitality and self-only Aura Wave. A problem with Kevin is that he only has a 50% chance to perform a level 3 FST outside boss fights, while Duelist's level 3 FST always hits everyone. Therefore, Duran is more reliable for Aura Wave based strategies. Then again, if there was an accessory that made Kevin always use his non-throw tech...

Dervish: Sure, Vanadis-Dervish-Archmage is one of the best teams I can think of. You'll get all stat-ups, stat-downs, Heal Light, Tinkle Rain, Anti-Magic, Aura Wave, Energy Ball, Freya + Change Form, MT level 2 spells for 6 elements, Rainbow Dust, Moon Saber and Leaf Saber.

Sefie1999AD, on 30 November 2015 - 05:05 PM, said:

Sorry, not possible; that part of the RNG sits in the "fun" section - that I can't expand.

Praetarius5018, on 30 November 2015 - 10:51 AM, said:

Since someone already did Dervish (one of my favorite teams) I'll do Death Hand

Paladin, Death Hand, Fenrir Knight
Gives you healing, anti magic, all elemental sabers, save leaf, defense up, magic shield, transshape, all debuffs, and turn undead

Alternatively you can swap out for:
Lord, Death Hand, Dragon Master
You lose out on Saint and Moon Sabers (PLD and FK), but you gain AOE sleep, twinkle rain, speed up, defense up, life booster, AOE poison and lunatic


Or if you need magical damage go with:

Paladin, Necromancer, Death Hand
Swaps the FK's utility magic for Necromancer's Black Curse and since she comes with twinkle rain Duran is free to go back to being a PLD to grab defense up and saint saber

or try

Grand Divina, Death Hand and Dragon Master
You lose out on Duran's buffs, but gain Angela's elemental magic and versatility.

Bishop, Wanderer, and Death Hand
Only buff is defense up and m.def up from magic shield, but you get a wide variety of light magic with Bishop as well as the elemental sabers to free DH up for melee and nearly every utility spell under the sun with Wanderer. Obvious downside is no debuffs to speak of, but you can swap Wanderer for Rogue and get those debuffs at the cost of anti magic.

looking for a team with Duran Kevin and Lisa. paladin and dervish & Vanadis? saint, dark, leaf, and power and techniques.

also Kevin(light), Lisa and Angela.

saliber70, on 03 February 2016 - 12:52 PM, said:

Depends on what you are looking for:

God Hand – Dragon Master – Rune Master
Kevin supplies plenty of healing and two buffs and two unique sabers, Lise provides all debuffs and anti-magic and is a good fighter and Angela contributes hard hitting elemental sniping magic and elemental sabers, if you give her a stat swap weapon and pump her luck she can be pretty deadly

Alternatively:

Warrior Monk, Star Lancer, Arch Mage

Kevin provides healing, Star Lancer provides stat enhancements, Arch Mage fills in the gaps bringing anti-magic and a few stat downs in addition to her elemental magic


Duran, Kevin, Lise Teams

Vanadis, Duelist, Dervish

Lise fills the healer role, Duelist brings elemental swords and anti-magic, Kevin brings in some stat downs and status effects in addition to some utility magic

Lord, Dragon Master, Death Hand

Duran is the healer, Lise does debuffs + anti-magic and Kevin brings the hurt with some elemental sabers

Paladin, Fenrir Knight, Death Hand

Duran is the healer, but to twinkle rain – he brings anti magic and saint saber, Fenrir Knight brings transshape and debuffs, and Kevin brings elemental sabers, or switch him to Dervish if you want the stat magic he brings

Hey all - I've read through this thread and still can't decide what party to go with. It will be my first time playing on hard mode and my playstyle is definitely that of the original Secret of Mana - 1 phys damage/tank, 1 healer/buffer, 1 nuker/debuffer. Any recommendations for characters and classes that is beginner friendly? I'll most likely replay with some of the more complex setups once I get a feel for the first playthrough.

EDIT: I'm thinking about starting with Swordmaster/Magus/Evil Shaman to start. Thoughts?

EDIT #2: Realized that group would leave me with no healer so I'm now Swordmaster/Magus/Bishop, although I feel like I have a lot of overlap/gaps with this setup. Is there a more balanced setup with Duran, Angela, and Carlie?