EOIV Rantage!!

[emailboxu]

End-game (Class specific) armour drops required to unlock said armour:



some of them you need a second drop but they're pretty common so if you've completed the regular monster compendium you should have them.

[Doktor_Q]

Blood bear: Crushed beneath my iron heel. Turns out, equipping both my Nightseekers with two armbind-forged weapons, guarding against his roar, and then just mercilessly hacking at him works pretty well.

[Wolkenritter]

[Maxine MagicFox]

So far, I'm enjoying this game and I wanted everyone else's opinions of this game vs others in the series. I think this one has bumped to the #2 slot so far, but I'm still pretty early in the game.

I think it already far surpasses EO3 - which I just lost motivation for. I just felt that EO3 had so many skills and just overcomplicated itself. This one managed to retain that original "simplicity" while adding in new details that made it feel more modern. I find that I'm feeling EXCITED to be in the labyrinths once again. In the first one, when the labyrinth felt like it was starting to become too generic and too "what the fuck am I traveling this labyrinth for ANYWAYS?" there was something new that popped up at about that time that re-excited my interest. This game so far seems to be managing to do that again.

And OMG I love the revamped item-point-farming system. You do not need to waste valuable skill points on them and you can farm all the points that you want even if you've already had a chop on that floor.

^_^ I just hope this game can match the mystery from the first one. The mystery that the previous two lacked.

[Doktor_Q]

The "mystery" is looking fairly generic so far (second land, first cave), but they haven't mentioned Titans at all so there's still that.

While I agree on the simplicity, I find it much harder to get a "pure" type than it was in EOIII- where I could build an entire character around exactly one set of skills, like "hitting really hard with normal attacks" or "passive healing" without losing much sleep over how I did things. Also, the Novice/Veteran/Master skill tiers make it more troublesome to build a character without taking a bunch of skill branches I don't care about.

My opinions may change once I have proper subclassing and retirements.

[Yoonah]

IV>III>II>I
Just because I cannot ever go back to the previous games after the later ones
Which is an EXCELLENT thing and why I love the EO series

[Garlyle]

To be fair, the level limitations on skillsets aren't generally so bad; they're intended to keep your party's power in check and keep you from getting overwhelmed at first, though there's also nothing bad about the initial skills in many cases - plenty of the classes have first-tier skills that are still going to see well over 20 points put into them regardless of final build. If it feels like you've got too many skill points, keep in mind that the entirely unnecessary "weapon mastery" skills that you used to put 10 points into as nothing but a prerequisite are now gone completely, and many more skills are actually useful and worth having. Investing in a secondary skill isn't nearly as worthless in EO4 as it was in previous games, and the opportunity cost of those skill points isn't as huge either.

In addition, resting in EO4 is only a two level penalty - I rested my party once each after the second, third, and fourth stratums and was still quite comfortable.

As for whether you have enough skills to build around a pure focus - it largely depends on what you want your focus to be, but many builds will invest a huge amount of skill points towards a single strategy. For instance, Link Landsknechts have: 3 for Enlightenment, 3 Sonic Raid, 10 in each link, 6 Vanguard, 8 Initiative, 8 Improved Link, and 6 Link Mastery - that's 64 points right there That's before taking useful passives like Iron Wall, Swordbreaker, and Power Boost from their own class - nevermind, say, subclass passives like Free Energy and Runic Guidance from Runemaster to amplify it further.

[Wolkenritter]

I'd say EO4 ranks as my top favorite. This one certainly feels the most balanced of the three. My only real complaint is the smaller maps.

[BlueMortimer]

I rather enjoy EOIV so far (as in, in the preliminary bits of the 5th Stratum ); there's a lot of polish to it, the art's fantastic, there's plenty of nods to previous games to go "oh hey, I remember that!" (or "OH GODS I REMEMBER THAT! AAAAAA", depending on the situation) at, the characters all feel balanced and useful (it was actually genuinely hard for me to decide what to use, though by this point I'm pretty secure in what I'm working with), and most of all, despite the smaller 'main areas', with all the side-areas I get the impression that each Land packs a bit more dungeoneering than past games' Strata had. Weirdly enough.

The plot's also rather well-done. There's a lot going on, and it's paced rather nicely -- every little bit of dungeoneering you do in the main story feels like it's actually got a purpose beyond 'we need to go deeper' -- I'd give examples, but I think it'd be a bit more meaningful to find it out on one's own.

So yeah, like the game quite a bit. I haven't gotten very far in I and II to compare it to either of them, but I'd say compared to III . . . well, while the lack of diverging plotlines makes it seem as though there's less to do in that regard, the fact that so much of the game is actually reset by the New Game + means that there's a lot more to revisit than in III; I even get to mash in the skulls of quests over again~!

However, I do still enjoy III very much, so I can't exactly rank EOIV over EOIII anytime soon either. I'm an indecisive kinda guy, so I'll leave it at that for now.

And now, for something slightly more "I'm curious about this, but it could be and might result in spoilers" so it's hidden:

[Wolkenritter]

[PLA]

Shadow Skills doesn't require two weapons at all, I guess.
Damage depends on Shadow Blade, though.

[Kimiko]

What I like about EO4 over EO3 is that it doesn't have a choice between two paths halfway through (at least so far; 5th dungeon) that requires two or three playthroughs to get the 'true' ending. I found that really annoying in EO3.

Also, the Count is a much nicer guy than that Chieftain from EO1.

[ettufoxy]

Boy skills are different this time around. No base stats to increase? I have been putting points into proficency. I am assuming that is usefull. Any one got more info on this? As for individual skills for my team just things that you would expext. Landschent is learning sonic raid. Dancer regen dance power waltz. Nightseeker is going assasian route. Sniper typical build. Fortress defence defence Defence!

[Doktor_Q]

Well.

I killed the first stratum boss with two characters- A fortress and a medic. Because he killed everyone else first, but couldn't kill the fortress and also never aimed at the medic. It was just badass enough for me to just accept the massive experience disparity it created.

[Dangerus]