Nyarlathotep's Dungeon: Brainstorming Topic!

[Taishyr]

Okay. I've been thinking about it, and this is the best I could figure out for a replacement for Nate.

Maya Amano (3.0-3.5?)
Stat build: Average, all stats. Sooooooo not worth attempting to incorporate a stat build setup into this.
Note: All healing/damage percents are when you get them. Maia Custom is still usable endgame, which is more a testament to Maia Custom.

Persona:
Floor 1: Maia (Hama (ID, Holy, ST, 36% chance), Dia (40% healing, ST), Aqua (25% Water damage, ST), Media (45% healing, MT), Multi Dimension (ID, non-typed (not phys, not magic), 20% chance)) - High Tec, Spd, Low Str; Immune Holy/Dark/Status

Floor 2: Tengu (Maha Garu (~30% Wind damage, GT/all), Gry (25% Almighty damage, GT/All), Iluzone (52% chance to blind opponent (drops mag/phys accuracy to 1/4th)), Wall of Air (Entire team immunes 1 Wind attack), Recarm (Revive with 50% HP), Blade of Fury (15% Sword damage, GT, physical)) - High Tec, Low Vit, Reflect Wind, Weak Earth

Floor 3: Maia Custom (Replaces Maia) (Hama (ID, Holy, ST, 36% chance), Invitation to Sleep (Sleep, Nerve, GT, 52% chance), Scratch (20% damage, Strike, physical, ST), Maha Aques (55% water damage, GT/all,) , Medirama (~90% healing, MT), Multi Dimension (ID, non-typed (not phys, not magic), 20% chance)) - Very High Tec, low Vit; Immune Holy/Dark/Status

Floor 4: Genbu (Paralyzing Bite (15% damage, 52% chance of causing Sleep, physical, ST), Wall of Earth (Team immunes 1 earth spell), Raku Kaja (Double one allies' physical defense), Magdyne (50% earth damage, ST), Maha Magdyne (55% earth damage, GT/all)) - Very High Vit, Low Tec, Spd, Void Earth, Strong Ice, Lightning, Nuclear, Weak Wind
             OR Byakko (Bite (20% damage, physical ST), Suku Kaja (double one allies' speed), Blizzard Breath (30% ice damage, 30% chance to freeze opponent, MT), Wall of Water (Team immunes 1 water spell), Acid Rain (40% water damage, MT)) - High Str, Agi, Low Tec, Vit, Immune Water/Ice, Weak Fire

Floor 5: Tsukiyomi (Sama Kaja (Double an allies' magic defense), Maka Kaja (Double an allies' magic power), Zandyne (60% almighty damage, ST), Magic Seal (Mute, GT/All, 24% chance), Mudoonn (ID, Dark, MT, 48% chance )) - High Tec, Immune Earth/Holy/Dark
              OR Genbu OR Byakko

Floor 6: Maihime Amano (Affectionate Prayer (75% healing, MT), Dance of Protection (Double one allies' def/magic def)), MASSIVE Tec, Low all other stats, immune water/holy/dark.
             AND Artemis (Bufudyne (45% ice damage, ST, 50% chance of freeze), Hypnotic Wave (Sleep, MT, 44% chance), Absolute Zero (35% ice magic, GT, 30% chance of freeze), Diarahan (Full heal, ST), Crescent Mirror (65% almighty damage, MT)) - Average stats, Reflect Magic, Weak Physical.

Advantages: Versatile mage, with healing, buffs, and damage!
Disadvantages: Doesn't get full revival, is almost always physically less durable. Some of her better skills require switches to worse Persona.

[Unoriginal]

Well, I've been thinking of a few possible additions, and while these two were originally shot down due to lack of playership, that problem's fixed itself somewhat over the years.

Maya (Legaia 2)

Pros: Lots of healing.  Starts with 50% MT healing, and quickly picks up status curing and revival, along with one of the better MT buffs around.  Also potential MT deterrence after a point, as not much can survive a boosted MA.  Fairly brutal twinking options should you get her to the aftergame.

Cons: Not particularly fast and somewhat frail if she's caught without Gospel up.  Also can't do anything but heal for the first couple of floors, and her non-MA damage isn't all that great unless she's striking an elemental weakness.



Kazan(Legaia 2)

Pro: Jeigan duty.  Not as overpowering as Marcus is for the first few floors, but he doesn't trail off nearly as badly.  Starts with good MT earth damage, and picks up a number of good equipment options, including an OPB reraise floor 7.  Also a good aftergame project.  As with Maya, the threat of an MA can help ward off MT.

Con: While he doesn't trail off as badly as Marcus, below average is still below average.

[superaielman]

Kazan deserves a 2.5 or a 3.0 for just how brutally he mops up the first three floors. MT magical damage off of killer speed? Good stats overall? Yikes.  He also doesn't really trial off like Marcus or Zemeckis, he always has MT damage (Nice) and while his MA isn't as scary as you'd expect, it's still a nice option. And Legaia equips are shiny as always.

No idea about Maya. 2.0? Gospel's great but you nicely hit on her problems, and that kind of durability gets brutally exploited in this format.

[superaielman]

Doublepost.

What about S3 Jeane as 0.5? I'm not sure how much it boosts magical speed, but if it's notable it's a hell of an interesting option.

[074]

Because I've been playing through DDS1 again and saw this thread, I had a completely random idea that I decided I might as well throw on there.  Mantra gain might be a bit out of place, but it's a hard estimate...

Cielo (DDS1) (3.0)
Resist Electricity, Weak Ailments
Stat spread as in-game, favoring Agility and Luck.

As for mantras, while one could give him the ones he starts with (making him particularly good early on), the other option would be for handling Mantras...

(Note: This is based on my own estimations and playthrough experience.  Some might have gone through a slower or faster progression, given that I ended the game at L51)

Floor 1: Bolt Spirit (Zio, Void Elec), Protection (Dia, Patra, Analyze)

Floor 2: Bolt Lord (Mazio, Elec Boost), Angel (Hama, Tarunda, Void Expel), available abilities at one time increase to six

Floor 3: Lightning (Zionga, Bolt Flare, Elec Repel), Fallen Hero (Media, Posumudi, Achedi), available abilities increase to eight

Floor 4: Bolt Emperor (Mazionga, Elec Drain), Fierce Spirit (Diarama, Paraladi, Me Patra), Thrones(Mahama, Sukunda, Expel Resist), Spirit (Pulinpa, Makajam, Dormina, Tarukaja)

Floor 5: Cherubim (Hamaon, Rakunda, Makatora), Karma (Marin Karin, Rakukaja, Sukukaja)

Floor 6: Bolt Master (Ziodyne, Elec Amp), Calm Spirit (Mediarama, Closedi, Cursedi)

----------------------------------------------

Floor 7a: Seraphim (Mahamaon, Makanda, Expel Repel) and Illusion (Makajamon, Calm Death, Makakaja)

or

Floor 7b: Bolt God (Maziodyne, Elec Resist)

----------------------------------------------

Floor 8a: Insane God (Xanadu, Dekaja, Dekunda) (requires taking 7a: Seraphim and Illusion)

 or

Floor 8b: Dark Leader (Last Word, Megidola, Mind Charge, Magic Repel) (Requires taking 7b: Bolt God)

-----------------------------------------------

Floor 9a: Vicious God (Vanity, Salvation, Mana Surge) (requires taking 8a: Insane God)

 or

Floor 9b: Dark Lord (Megidolaon, Null Element) (requires taking 8b: Dark Leader)


Pros: Eventually gets a skillset from hell.  DDS buffs are hard to beat when stacked, and he can do a variety of things in a given fight.  Only gets better later on.
Cons: WEAK TO STATUS EFFECTS.  I repeat, WEAK TO STATUS EFFECTS.  Average speed.  Not very notable outside of the skillset.  Press Turn and Expel interpretations may vary.


Feel free to smack me.

[Taishyr]

...Huh. That's actually quasi-reasonable. Granted, I was thinking just Argilla with her base skills as a healer type, and not wanting to touch a free-roaming Serph. >_> This does look pretty balanced.

Only one question at first glance, though.

Is it Seraphim + one of Illusion or Bolt God or
Seraphim + Illusion or Bolt God? In the latter, the choice, I would hope, would be obvious; so I'm guessing the former but wanted to clarify.


Also, how much -does- S3 Jeane boost spell speed by?

[074]

Seraphim+Illusion or Bolt God.  Basically, it's a path choice, pending if you want the Insane God (Needing both Seraphim and Illusion) path or the Dark Leader (requiring a maxed Elemental string) path.  Also, we're talking two Difficulty-5s versus a Difficulty-6.


...of course, by Floor 10, you might get the other path anyway, but...*shrugs*.  Just tried to extrapolate his abilities from how you first get him in-game, and reverse-engineer a progression from Floor 1 (Of course, things might start differently if people give him his mastered Mantras from the start, but...*shrugs*)


Also, you're not the only one not wanting to touch a free-roaming Serph.  Stat progressions being selectable is just WRONG.  Additionally, Heat or Argilla were tempting as simpler options, but I wanted something a little less straightforward.  Thus, Cielo.

[Taishyr]

Stats aren't the issue; just make him average, like with my Maya suggestion. (Granted, P2 stats are all vaguely useful, whereas SMT:DDS stats... uhm.)

Also, ah. You may want to specify that those are two completely different paths with 7a/7b, 8a/8b, 9a/9b. But that makes some sense, yes.

[Nephrite]

Also, how much -does- S3 Jeane boost spell speed by?

10%.

[Dark Holy Elf]

-6 actually. I think that's a raw reduction rather than percent, so it might end up around 13% or so to an average speed (45) spell.. If it's a percent, it's... not very good.

[Nephrite]

Oh, whoops, I saw that Rune Sage went up to -10 and assumed that that's what it meant. I didn't realize Jeane can't even get up to an S in Rune Sage... that seems really stupid.

Either way, I'd let her get to S on Floor 8, for whatever nominal increase that would offer over -6.

[Sir Donald 3.2]

Here are a few thoughts I have had based on some discussion with people. Any thoughts or comments are appreciated.

...

Relm 2.5

Choose three Espers. You gain those three espers depending on when you could in-game.

For example: You choose Ramuh. Relm gains Ramuh and all of its spells on Floor 3.

Pros: Takes full advantage of Relm's great magic stat. Very versatile choice for the points spent.
Cons: No espers for at least two or three floors. A lot of the good stuff isn't until later.

Is this still valid?  I haven't seen it noted on the Dungeon Wiki.

If not, then I think that we need to make Relm learn the spells via Magic Exp.

Also, is there a valid "Summon" Command in FF6A?   If not, then wouldn't Relm be limited to 1 Esper per Battle?  (Her Choice, can summon same Esper as many times as she wants so long as she has MP.  Would still justify the +0.5.  )

[Nephrite]

http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php?title=Full_List_of_Dungeon_Participants#Relm.2C_Final_Fantasy_6_.28With_Espers.29

I believe you can only summon one Esper per battle in FF6, but yes, she'd get a choice as to which she would summon. As for Magic EXP, It'd basically be 'she gains the spells the fight after the first,' which is a bit unnecessary.. at least to me, anyway! I know it isn't completely true to FF6, but it's hard to be.

[Unoriginal]

Had too much time on my hands and came up with a couple of admittedly less-than-serious noms.

Xenos (Growlanser 2)

Pros: Very, very hard to kill once he gets going.  Berserk hits for absurd amounts of damage once he picks it up.  I'd hype Bait, but it'd get me shot.  Some very nice aftergame options.

Cons: One dimensional.  Not particularly fast.  Low Int makes him slightly vulnerable to status if he's caught without the appropriate Defense skill up.  Lord only knows I'm too lazy to come up with a proper damage average for the game.  Votership is obviously an issue.


The Jogurt Horde
Start with 1x Jogurt.  At the end of each floor, restore the Jogurts to their full numbers, then triple the base amount.

Pros: If you can get them to the later floors, you'll have a massive swarm of biting, gnawing, clawing rodents to swarm over those who can't deal with their massive numbers.

Cons: Takes several floors to build their numbers to useful amounts.  The lot of them fry to any MT attack, so you'll need some way of protecting them.

-or-

EMPEROR Jogurt

Pros: Promotes to a VP Hamster if you get him to the aftergame floors.

Cons: You're still using Jogurt for 7 floors.

[Bardiche]

Suggestions tiem?


Rebecca (Wild Arms 5)

Pros: She can chain attack, gets a choice of 1 Medium per floor. First three Mediums for floors 1-3, then a newer Medium for 4, 5, 6 respectively. Starts each battle with full HP, revives at the end of each fight, but suffers from (non-permanent) HP reduction.

Cons: WA5 endurance isn't too great. Mediums give only very limited skillsets. Chain attacking doesn't trigger too often.

Note: If you want to hype badges, Rebecca gets even better! Badges'd need some decisions on when each badge is available, though...

---------------

Lakche/Lache (Fire Emblem 4)

Pros: High physical stats: HP, Strength, Speed, Skill and Luck. Meteor Sword, Continue and Pursuit really rack up that attack power, Hero Sword helps. Moonlight Sword can pierce defenses.

Cons: Attack triggers aren't that reliable.

---------------

Lucia (Lunar 2) (... lol...)

Pros: First floor gets its ass wiped. Lucia is UNSTOPPABLE.

Cons: After that, she's terrible. Doesn't really recover much, stays decent towards midgame to endgame.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Yay, Lucia hype!

Rebecca hype is also cool, but I propose to see Ice Queen Avril as a boss somewhere. She doesn't have much of a skillset, but she's got some nice stats. Also... fighting-in-Avril's-mind hype!

-Djinn

[Dark Holy Elf]

Re Rebecca, I don't think many people would give her the "heals to full after every battle" thing. Seems to me like it's thrown out for other games that do similar things (WA4 most obviously, and many SRPGs). Also what's wrong with WA5 endurance? That comment didn't make much sense; casts don't really vary in endurance. Unless you meant they lack status/element blockers which... okay.

Re FE4, I really don't think FE4 has the votedraw to justify someone in the dungeon, but that's just me. If you wanted a nasty FE physical powerhouse you could accomplish the same thing with FE10 for instance.

Lucia sounds kinda cool, but she'd have to have a pretty low ranking. She's pretty much a substantially worse Marcus (owns floor 1 even harder, but Marcus owns it badly enough... then immediately sucks far worse than him for the rest of the dungeon, but especially the next few floors).

[Bardiche]

I recall struggling with enemies earier on, and spending quite some time getting badges to twink etc. Not to mention I usually end my WA5 fights without getting a hit in return.

(Castle Walls, Double Cast and Hi-Blast cheese.)

[Talaysen]

I recall struggling with enemies earier on, and spending quite some time getting badges to twink etc. Not to mention I usually end my WA5 fights without getting a hit in return.

(Castle Walls, Double Cast and Hi-Blast cheese.)

Umm, that's enemies having good damage, not the cast failing at durability.  Has nothing to do with DL scaling.

I mean, in that case, Grandia cast for Godlike!  They can take like a million hits!

[Bardiche]

I'm new to this scaling thing.

[DjinnAndTonic]

I'm curious on how team mechanics of certain games would work in the dungeon.

For example, if a Chrono Cross character was added to the selectable crew, would their "Field Effect" meter effect other party members' elemental attacks? Alternately, would other party members' elemental skills effect the Field Effect meter, if the Field Effect mechanism would carry over at all...

Another example, Lazlo from Suikoden 4 can use the 'Rush' ability whenever he builds up his limit meter and has a full party. This ability seems like it could be used once a floor as long as Lazlo's party members are all alive.

Still Suikoden, if two party members have compatible Runes, but come from different Suikoden games, can they still use combination Rune spells? Only applies to late floors in the dungeon anyway. Along the same lines, if you pick two Suikoden characters who have a unite attack (not sure if there are any in the current lineup...), would they be able to spam it in the dungeon? More relevant, curious if WA4, SaGa Frontier, Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star IV characters can do this too? Along the same lines, but more of a stretch - if a Disgaea character uses a physical while 'standing next to' another party member using the same kind of weapon, would they be able to perform a cooperative attack? (No available Dis characters, but it's a purely academic question.)

In games where party members share resources (thinking WA4 and SoA, but there could be others?), do party members from different games still contribute to 'building up' their resource bar (FP meter in WA4, SP bar in SoA)?

Lots of games have really interesting team systems that don't really carry over in the DL, but it would be cool to see what kinds of effects they could have in the Dungeon.

-Djinn

[VySaika]

Along the same lines, if you pick two Suikoden characters who have a unite attack (not sure if there are any in the current lineup...), would they be able to spam it in the dungeon?

If you pick two people with a Unite Attack(say S1's Kai was added to the dungeon and you picked him and Tir), then there's absolutely no reason why they couldn't(barring things like unbalance or other unpleasant side effects of the Unite Attack that prevent spam).

And WA4 characters most certainly can. Infinity Dragon almost broke the dungeon with Yulie/Raquel/Timelord, using Yulie and Raq's MP restoring force combo to let TL overdrive as often as he wanted.

As for SaGa characters, I'm not sure. SaGa combos aren't specificly chosen attacks like Suiko Unites and WA4 Force Combos. They're just an added bonus that sometimes kicks in when you use certain moves together. I'd personally not consider them, as it's kind of a headache and you need a very specific turn order to pull off anything decent.

In games where party members share resources (thinking WA4 and SoA, but there could be others?), do party members from different games still contribute to 'building up' their resource bar (FP meter in WA4, SP bar in SoA)?

The other one that stands out to me here is VP's energy bar. I certainly count non-VP characters' attacks as still adding to the energy meter. Only like +10-20 energy or something small like that, but every little bit is helpful at getting those delicious PWS attacks going, y'know?

[Bardiche]

I was told, I forget by whom, that Tir and Riou in my team can still do their COMBINATION ATTACK gig, but maybe that depends on personal interpretation.

[Yakumo]

Well, considering that Lyon and Freyjadour specifically mention(mentioned?  I don't know if they're both still available) that they comboed well together, I assume they are meant to have them.

[Talaysen]

For example, if a Chrono Cross character was added to the selectable crew, would their "Field Effect" meter effect other party members' elemental attacks? Alternately, would other party members' elemental skills effect the Field Effect meter, if the Field Effect mechanism would carry over at all...

I don't see how this changes from the DL honestly.  Enemy attacks in CC change the Field as well.  Do you allow the opponents in the DL to change the Field with elemental attacks and use it to their advantage?  If the answer is no, then you probably shouldn't in the dungeon.  Exception is if there are multiple CC members, but then only they could change it.  I also don't see this as fair because enemies screw it up in-game, so they should be able to do that here.

Another example, Lazlo from Suikoden 4 can use the 'Rush' ability whenever he builds up his limit meter and has a full party. This ability seems like it could be used once a floor as long as Lazlo's party members are all alive.

Well, is that a property of Lazlo or the battle system?  If it's a property of Lazlo, then yes.  If it's a property of the battle system, then no.  I don't recall specifics on it, but it did seem like a property of Lazlo to me I think?

Still Suikoden, if two party members have compatible Runes, but come from different Suikoden games, can they still use combination Rune spells? Only applies to late floors in the dungeon anyway.

Umm, they're not compatible if they're from different games.  Some Suikoden games don't even HAVE combo spells.  I think only 4/5 did?  I guess you could argue the 4/5 combos across those two games IFF they're the same runes in both games and IFF they're the same spell in both games, etc.  I don't think this is the case.

Along the same lines, if you pick two Suikoden characters who have a unite attack (not sure if there are any in the current lineup...), would they be able to spam it in the dungeon? More relevant, curious if WA4, SaGa Frontier, Chrono Trigger and Phantasy Star IV characters can do this too?

Don't see why not.

Along the same lines, but more of a stretch - if a Disgaea character uses a physical while 'standing next to' another party member using the same kind of weapon, would they be able to perform a cooperative attack? (No available Dis characters, but it's a purely academic question.)

Not the same lines at all.  Personally, it seems kind of weird to allow another character who does not have this "skill" to join in on a cooperative attack to do so.  Now, you could argue the other way around, when a character outside of Disgaea initiates the attack and the Disgaea character joins in.  That one makes more sense at least.

Though obviously if both are from Disgaea that should probably be allowed.

In games where party members share resources (thinking WA4 and SoA, but there could be others?), do party members from different games still contribute to 'building up' their resource bar (FP meter in WA4, SP bar in SoA)?

Yeah, definitely.  However, I don't think this should be carried over to VP.  For one, VP energy drains between turns, which means the energy built up is gone before the next person's turn.  For two, we already butcher the VP system in the DL by allowing energy to carry over (when it can't in-game) and I can't see allowing BOTH carry over and other characters to add to it.  The only reason we allow the carry over is because people can't PWS on their own without it.

(For the record, I'm not even sure I allow carry over PWS gauge in the DL anymore.  In that case, I might allow VP characters who get their turns at the same time to boost the gauge together, but not if they get their turns at different times, since there's space between their turns to let the energy drain.)

Lots of games have really interesting team systems that don't really carry over in the DL, but it would be cool to see what kinds of effects they could have in the Dungeon.

-Djinn

Kind of the point to the dungeon really.