Fighting a Dragonfly in Valley of Corrupted Gravity. Of the three characters, only Rose has a Dragoon Spirit at this point, so only she can gain Spirit Points and has a Spirit Gauge; Dart's Spirit is stolen and Meru's is not until Prison Island
Battle occurs when Dart (or any movable character) moves around an area with monsters, when the arrow above his/her head slowly turn from blue to yellow.
If the color turns to red, it means means the player is going to encounter an enemy very soon. The screen will melt to a battle scene after the arrow remained red for a while, initiating battle. A Charm Potion used in the menu (Use It) turns the red arrow blue, because it resets the encounter value to zero.
Whether on the battle screen or a town screen, to turn the arrows on or off, use the L1 or R1 buttons. Use the directional controls to switch selection between characters and between enemies. Characters cannot be targeted with offensive actions, enemies cannot be targeted with friendly actions. Moving the selection cursor around is deceptively difficult and frankly, unnecessarily clunky, using a system of real time orientation of characters on the screen rather than simpler rotation through an arbitrarily decided but fixed roster order. If it looks like left or up or whatever should switch but doesn't, try another direction
Generally speaking, Monsters in a new area will have higher Hit Points, Attack and Magic Attack than those in the previous area. Their Defense and Magic Defense and their Evades are only a way to differentiate different sorts of enemies within an area. If those stats went up too, the amount of damage dealt would not increase as noticeably and some sense of progression would be lost.
Battle Commands[]
Indicators (blue triangle) on/off with L1 or R1 buttons. Up/Down,L/R to switch between characters and enemies
In battle, the player will at least have one opponent. The character/monster who has the highest speed will usually attack first. The player has to make his choice to act upon the opponent. This can be done from a menu of choices.
Attack[]
The player will dash to the chosen enemy and strike it. The character will attack in different ways according to what Addition the player has chosen. When the enemy reaches 0 HP, it will vanish with a red hue, indicating that it has been defeated.
The damage of player varies with the player's attack stat and the defense stat of the enemies. However, there are three results of player's attack upon the enemy (addition's success not counted here):
- Successfully executed the attack upon the enemy, inflicting damage.
- Missed when attacking the enemy (instead of yellow number, the orange word "Miss" appear), zero damage.
- Successfully executed the attack upon the enemy without miss but damage still zero, *the enemy used a physical or magical barrier.
Guard[]
- Main article: Guard (Battle Command)
The character will defend and heal 10% of their max health. When the enemy attacks the defending player, they only recieve half damage. Blocking cannot be used in Dragoon mode.
Items[]
- Main article: Items
The Player can use healing items, attack items, special-effect attack items, repeat items, or effect-curing items by throwing them upwards or towards the enemy. After using it, the player's turn is over and the turn either goes to other character or the enemy.
Escape[]
Dart has the same chance of running away if he is this damaged (under a quarter of his health remaining), but with an increased chance of dying to enemy attacks before being able to do so
The characters will turn away from the enemies and attempt to run away from them, However the probability of success depends on player's level. If the escape failed, the player stays on the battle scene with his turn over. Ironically, since characters that are low on health will continue to take damage if Escape is unsuccessful, Escape's best use is not as a means of avoiding imminent death and a Game Over, but to avoid enemies that offer too little XP or are otherwise inconvenient. As with all turn-based games, Escape and Flee and other such commands are a mainstay of the Speed Run Challenge, since it almost always takes less time to run away than it does to finish a fight. And for obvious reasons, the Low Level Challenge.
Dragoon[]
- Main article: Dragoon
- Note that this is not available on certain rare battles according to the story, especially on the Moon.
The player takes out his/her Dragoon Spirit. The Dragoon Spirit flashes and the player transforms into a Dragoon based on their element. The player's stats increase according to their dragoon multiplication percentage. The character also enters their unique elemental dimension and all his attacks is converted into elemental type. The player's battle menu changes to dragoon mode with only Dragoon Attack and Dragoon Magic available.
- Dragoon Attack
- A circle (in the form of dragoon spirit) will appear. There is a flash dot and an arrow around it. The player must attempt to complete five successful rounds by pressing accurately when the flash dot touches the arrow. A complete Dragoon Addition will finish with an elemental aura blast.
- Dragoon Magic
- The player can use their respective Dragoon Magic.
Besides the special condition above, Dragoon option is unavailable when the character's dragoon meter is not more than one full SP bar. If player has two or more full SP bars , the player must finish turns in Dragoon form consecutively before returning to normal form.
Special[]
- Main article: Special (Battle Command)
The player and his group turn instantly into dragoons with the player's dragoon animation. This is only available when:
- There are three characters in battle.
- All the characters SP gauges are up to their maximum.
Battle Stats[]
- Main article: Status
- HP (Hit Points): Each point of damage reduces one Hit Point, and at zero HP the character is incapable of any action, and must be revived with Angel's Prayer or magic to continue in the current battle. If a new battle is initiated with the character still dead and still in party, they will be automatically revived with one HP.
- Attack : Damage with Additions and Dragoon Additions, completed or not, depends on Attack, or AT.
- Defense : Compared with the foe's Attack to determine damage taken.
- Magic Attack : Increases damage dealt by magical attacks and magical attack items
- Magic Defense : Compared with the foe's Magic Attack to determine damage taken.
- Speed : The time between the start of combat and the character getting their first and successive turns, depends on their speed stat.
- A-HIT (Attack Hit) : Affects the chance that physical attacks will hit
- M-Hit (Magical Hit) : Affects chance of magical attacks hitting
- Avoidance : Usually known as Evade. Attacks may miss based on the attacker's A-HIT and M-HIT stats, compared with the defender's Avoid chance for melee attacks (AV) or magic attacks (MV).
Elemental Attack[]
Each elemental attack corresponds effectively to a specific elemental monster. This is a chart displaying elements and their weaknesses. Thunder Element has no weaknesses.
If a character wears a element-specific Dragoon Armour, then an elemental attack which had the same type as of the player's element can be nullified.
| Element 1 | Element 2 |
|---|---|
| Fire | Water |
| Earth | Wind |
| Dark | Light |
Element 1 is weakest or strongest compared to element 2 and vice versa. Fire deals more damage to water and vice versa. However, fire deals less damage to fire. The player can only execute elemental attacks when they have element-enchanted weapons:
| Character | Weapon | Special effect |
|---|---|---|
| Dart | Heat Blade | Deal fire damage |
| Rose | Shadow Cutter | Deal darkness damage |
| Albert/Lavitz | Twister Glaive | Deal wind damage |
| Haschel | Thunder Fist | Deal thunder damage |
| Meru | None | None |
| Shana/Miranda | Sparkle Arrow | Deal light damage |
| Kongol | None | None |
Besides weapons, the player can also execute elemental attacks by using magic items or Dragoon magics. Dragoon Magic does more damage than most items.
Status Ailments[]
- Main article: Status Ailments
Abnormalities can affect the opponents differently. They can be executed by an enemy using their attacks or the player using their items. However, not all special effects can be used by the player. All ailments can be removed by visiting Clinics, or Changing into Dragoon form.
| Ailment | Description | Player usable (Items) | Player usable (Weapons) | Cure | Prevention (Equipment) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Poison (Green hue with bubbles) | Victim will lose 10% of health per turn | Poison Needle | Virulent Arrow (Shana/Miranda) | Body Purifier | Armor of Yore, Poison Guard |
| Confusion (Yellow hue with question marks) | Victim will perform a random action each turn | Panic Bell | Mind Crush (Dart), Bemusing Arrow (Shana/Miranda) | Mind Purifier | Phoenix Plume, Panic Guard |
| Stun (Character faints with yellow hue and transparent bubbles) | Victim canot perform any action | Stunning Hammer | Flamberge (Rose), Heavy Mace (Meru), Beast Fang (Haschel), Great Axe (Kongol) | Mind Purifier/ being attacked/ wears off after a few turns | Armor of Yore, Stun Guard |
| Fear (Character shakes with blue hue and floating skulls) | Victim's Attack and Defense decreases | Midnight Terror | Spear of Terror (Albert), Demon Stiletto (Rose) | Mind Purifier | Phoenix Plume, Bravery Amulet |
| Bewitchment (Pink hue with floating hearts) | Victim will attack teammates | None | None | Mind Purifier | Phoenix Plume, Magic Ego Bell |
| Dispiriting (Character appears tired or sad) | Victim will gain 0 SP | None | None | Mind Purifier | Phoenix Plume, Active Ring |
| Arm Blocking (Black smoke with some sphere puffs) | Victim cannot perform a certain action | None | None | Wears off after a few turns/enemy responsible for afflicting the ailment is defeated | Armor of Yore, Protector |
| Petrify (Character faints with a levitating rock above) | Victim 'Turns to stone' | None | None | Depetrifier | Destone Amulet |
- Note: All abnormal stats can be prevented with a Rainbow Earring.
Abnormal stats has no effect on bosses. The higher the level of player, the higher the chance of generating an abnormal stat on the enemy, the higher the chance the player can avoid the abnormal stat.
Nullification[]
Material Shield nullifies the damage dealt by the enemy's physical attack, for three turns. Magic Shield nullifies the damage dealt by the enemy's magical attack, for three turns. Enemy's Physical or Magical Barrier acts the same as players' Material or Magic Shield respectively. Some armor parts have an rare skill to nullify some elemental damage.
Others[]
Number Colors[]
- Yellow: Damage Points
- Blue: Healing Points
- Green: Spirit Points
- Purple: Magic Points
Frequency of encounter[]
For every location there are different areas (screens). Each area have different types or saturation/alignment of monsters. However, there is one area in each location which player can encounter monsters more frequently (look at color change on the arrow). Exceptions are: Hellena Prison, Kazas, the Black Castle and the Death Frontier, where battle only occurs when player collide with monsters/enemies. In these areas, the color of the arrow will always be red.