Was thinking about trying out a 4 person party for the 1st time (don't laugh I only got the game recently!). My previous ones have been based around heavy melee damaging fighters and valkeries so I though I'd go for some critical hitting action this time round.

Thought I'd go for Monk, Samurai, Ranger & Bishop - will I have sufficient melee power at the start / middle of the game when you don't critical hit that often? Also will it make opening those 8 tumbler locks on Ascension Peak impossible by not having anyone with locks & traps?

Any improvements I could make to it?

You have 3 Knock-Knock casters (Sam,Ran,Bis). All 3 can cast on a lock one after the other in one round( the first lifts some thumblers, the second some of the remaining ones and so on... ) And there are items with the knock-knock spell, so I'm sure you can open those doors.


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[ 06-24-2004, 07:03 AM: Message edited by: Loudhy ]

Never knew that, thanks [img]smile.gif[/img]

Looks a good group. Should work well.
Good luck

In addition, keep the cap from lower monstary wich gives you +10 lickpick skill. It is enough to lock the last tumbler.

I'd concentrate the bishop early on divinity so he can get magic screen as soon as possible. Armorplate is really good as well.

Monk, Samurai and Ranger won't be great tanks until later so you will have some challenges. They will be decent and gain much more later. A tricky thing will be to make sure they do some magic, have them cast at least once per battle after lev 5 if possible. It is too easy to let the Bishop do it all and they suffer from lack of magic development. It will take forever (OK, maybe lev 17) for them to get Portal or other helpful spells if you don't exercise them. My 2 centavos.

That party is pretty close to what I'm running right now. I have a Monk (most kills), a Lord, a Ranger and a Bishop. I'm around level 10 and I'm enjoying it. I don't think you will have too many problems although you might have to change your tactics since you only have 4 people.

Nice to meet you, Nodscene. Better than your Ob brother...bad pun. Yeah, I think it's a good party. Working on SAmurai, Ninja, Lord and Bishop. Very similar. We are lev 17 and nobody's fool.

Talk about good omens!!!

The very 1st action in the 1st combat with the crabs at the start was for my monk to chuck a shuriken at one and instant kill it. I think there's only a 1% chance of that happening.

Played up to the Arnika road so far, not had any major problems apart from a bit of trouble with a large group of pestilent rats in the upper monastry. Been making sure I train everyone's magic by letting off combat spells at near maximum allowable power towards the end of combat with only a couple of enemies left, that way if it backfires I don't have people asleep or terrorised etc. at a vital point.

I've also made sure that I added points to artifacts and thrown / sling when I level up so that I can use the better items later in the game without to much backfiring

You've probably already started but I would recommend taking the Bishop out of there. If you're melee heavy, don't use him. I would recommend a Lord instead since you're still going to have plenty of magic. I ran 3 Gadg. and they did fine. I find the Bishop almost too good so I don't use him. Maybe in a 2 person party or something?

The bishop is necessary to get the priest and mage buffs early. At lest in expert/ironman, this is very important. If you just want high early offensive power, a mage is usually much better.

I'm running a 4 person party now of sam, ninja, gad, and Fighter/cleric. It's been a great party lvl 21 going to assention peak. The fighter cleric is duel wielding beastslayer and diamond eyes and by far is the most effective than the other two sam, ninja. I did 2 levels of fighter then switch to cleric until I got 5th level spells then back to fighter. Sam and ninja using bushido blade and ench. w. and nunchucka. gad. using neg air and heal all stone with an awsome omni gun. the omni gun seems more effective at special effects than the percentages suggest. It's been a great party, I think I will change the ninja to a Ranger next.

I'm really surprised that people don't use the Gadg. more. Now that I have a party of 3, I think all my future parties will suck in comparison. Three Vaporizor's and the battles get real' short!