Messages

"Strength" is a broad term that includes all the combat stats, not just Atk. It was just the same in Vanilla.
BTW it also resets Agi and Resistance increases

[Information provided]

Hey, looks like I'll be the first one to comment. First of all welcome! and congratulations on having your own proyect here, it's good seeing new stuff. I have a lot of constructive criticism, I'll try to be a thorough as possible, but everything I say is of course *my* opinion and you are free to disagree. Also, all of this is coming from theory-crafting and watching the numbers, I haven't actually tested anything in-game yet

The TLDR is: I love what you did with the classes, the new psynergies and I love the spreadsheets... The changes you did to the existing psynergy not so much.

Information provided

I'll start with the technicalities regarding the spreadsheet and info provided. As I said I really like the spreadsheet it is easy to read and well organized, the information on your post is likewise very clear. I have a few comments on how to make it better:

[spoiler]
First: I like that you added the spoiler explanation for the 3 element classes, for anyone that doesn't know how it works, it is very thorough and clear. HOWEVER there's this line: "I can say with confident that virtually no player of Golden Sun has actually internalized these rules on a conceptual level." This comes out a bit arrogant, specially considering most people in this forum will actually know this already. Maybe rephrase it or eliminate that line altogether, it doesn't really do much.

Second: The list of the psynergy changes is good, but I think it would be easier to read if each psynergy you are explaining was either bold or underlined

Regarding the spreadsheet

Third: In the clases sheet you specify that the psynergies with a * are only available to higher class tiers, but none of the psynergies have it. Also (if implemented) it would be nice to know just what tier it is instead of "higher".

Fourth: The psynergies that have a secondary effect would benefit having that present in some way, both new and old. Also all psynergies would like having their range specified.

Fifth: Not all psynergies are present in the tab. Specifically the alternate versions that 3 element classes get of typical psynergies (Demon Spear, Guardian, Magic Shell, Mist). They should be there if only for completion's sake, also for newer players that don't know/remember what these do.

Sixth: The revives don't have the proper frames they look like they are part of the "Multiplier EPAs"

Seventh: I realise that this is a lot of extra work you may not want to do. But an extra spreadsheet with all the psynergy info grouped by class would be awesome. Something like what the GS Wiki has.
[/spoiler]

Class Changes

Here I'll discus the changes you made to the classes. Like I said I mostly love these changes, it's beautiful having so many options instead of the old 2 brute 2 apprentice. Also Isaac and Felix, and Ivan and Sheba absolutely needed class differentiation. However it does feel like you were a bit shy with the changes.

[spoiler]
First: Felix and Isaac classes have pretty much the exact same stat multipliers and share a lot of psynergies, they don't really feel that much different. Regarding the psynergies I would recommend having only one of them with Quake and Cure, so they only share Ragnarok and Revive which would be the "staples" of physical Venus Adepts. Have the one that doesn't get Cure get some other supporting psynergy (Stat buff/debuff or status infliction).
[spoiler]Sure, there aren't that many Venus suporting psynergies, but you could always swap the element of any of the Samurai's variants to Venus and use that one without having to go over all the classes to check if the elements make sense[/spoiler]
This can be done in two ways:

• Have Felix keep Cure, since your hack is only for TLA you don't have the issue of needing a healer in TBS early game. If you were to do a TBS hack consistent with this you would have to give a new healing Psynergy to Ivan's innate class (Garet doesn't really fit, does he?).
• Have Isaac keep Cure, in order to be more consistent with how TBS is. This means you would have to give some new healing Psynergy for Jenna or Sheba's innate class for the early game.

Regarding the stats I would recommend at least a + or - 10 difference in HP and PP between them: The one that gets Cure gets +10PP -10HP compared to the one that doesn't.

Second: Likewise Ivan and Sheba don't look that different either. Whirlwind should surely be their "staple" since you need it for the puzzles but I think having both get Impact, Ward and Bind is a bit much, Bind could be the second "staple" but the others have to change. As for Jupiter supporting psynergies you have Dull and Weaken that could be used in exchange of Impact and Ward, also you could give one of them the healing psynergies that their fellow Venus adept lost.
Regarding the stats I think Ivan's atk could use a buff up to 130 to compensate for the 10 less luck compared to Sheba.

Third: Jenna and Garet are fine. I don't quite like them both having Guard AND Impair, but its not a big deal. Likewise Mia and Piers are fine, though maybe have only one of them have Break (Ply, Cure Poison and Restore would be "staples")

Fourth: I really like that you split the shared 2 elemental classes into 2 variants each, but I couldn't help but notice that some pairs are more similar than others, for example: Venus-Mars and Venus-Mercury share 5 psynergies, while Venus-Jupiter share only 1. I think leaning into the differences would be a good idea, have half the supporting psynergies be on one class and the other half in the other, also you could switch Wish for the alternatives. It would be something like:

• Scavanger: Planetary - Spire - Growth - Fire - Revive -Haunt - Condemn
  Brute: Helm Splitter - Volcano - Thorn - Starburst - Revive - Impair - Curse
• Swordsman: Cutting Edge - Thorn - Ply - Harvest - Revive - Break - Avoid
  Caster: Froth - Growth - Cure - Wish - Revive -Cure Poison - Restore 

I'd say too many 2 elemental classes have Wish in your setup, it would be good to see Aura and Harvest there, not only for variety but also because they being learned at different levels means during different portions of the game some of the classes can heal more than the others, modifying the strategies you want to use every time. And also because in the endgame Wish heals a lot, sure, but it is also expensive, and some of the classes that you gave wish to don't have the PP multipliers to really use it, they would actually prefer having the cheaper options (as long as they are efficient HP/PP), the Swordsman with 140% PP would run out instantly with Wish, maybe not so fast with Harvest.

Fifth: Regarding the stats of the 2 elemental classes, if you check the stat distributions within each pair they look good, they are similar (though not identical) in the ones that makes sense for them to be similar (Venus-Mars and Jupiter-Mercury) and different in the ones that makes sense for them to be different, that's awesome. However there is another consideration to be had regarding the stats and that is the variation in stats each adept has at their disposal:

• Venus adepts: More physical with Mars, more psynergical with Jupiter, balanced/defensive with Mercury. That's awesome
• Mars adepts: More physical with Venus, more psynergical with Jupiter, balanced/defensive with Mercury. That's great
• Jupiter adepts: More psynergical with Venus, more psynergical with Mars, more psynergical with Mercury. That's weird, but they are both primarily casters, aren't they?
• Mercury: More psynergical with Venus, more psynergical with Mars, more psynergical with Mercury. Now this is a big problem, Mia maybe doesn't care that much, but poor Piers has no physical option, that's not right

I think Jupiter adepts should have 1 class with a decent atk multiplier of 150 and seeing as Page has Astral Blast that should probably be it and they could afford losing 10 in PP of speed. It's fine for them not to have a full on Physical with 160atk or a Defensive class since it doesn't really fit them.

Mercury adepts should have at the very least a Defensive-physical class which could be with Venus with stats like (200 130 150 160 130 130). Or more generally, a physical class with Mars (200 120 160 140 160 90) and a balanced/defensive with Venus (200 160 140 160 120 120).

Finally, this is less important than the previous ones but the balanced/defensive Mars>Mercury class doesn't really suit Jenna much I think it would be better if it was balanced/offensive with more PP an lower def (190 150 150 140 150 120). Its a small change but I think it would work better for Jenna without compromising Garet much. Also both Venus>Mercury and Mars>Mercury are VERY similar, this change would bring them a bit further apart.

Sixth: I love that you completed the 3 elemental classes roster, it always bugs me that there are so few options there. The new spells seem fun and I really like that you gave every class at least 1 exclusive one. Since every character now has 6 options for 3 elemental classes I would expect lots of different strategic setups for every character: Fast frail physical offense (Ninja), Fast frail Psynergy offense (Time Mage), Slow bulky physical offense (Samurai), Slow bulky Psynergy offense (?), Defensive support (Paladin), fast support (Necromancer)... So yeah, there's some nice variety there.
This is maybe nitpicking so don't take it too seriously...Still there is one hole: the only class that could work as Slow Bulky psynergy offense is the Paladin, but it's set is more oriented for support. I think having one or two classes that are slow, have lower atk but top tier PP and good defenses and have access to some of the stronger psynergies would be a good idea.

Apart from that, although somewhat related, I can see checking the available sets, that Venus, Mars and Mercury Adepts have pretty varied options, covering most of the mentioned. However Jupiter Adepts don't really have that, all of their sets are fast and frail (except for Bard which is slow and frail I guess? Very strange stats there). Giving them a Slow bulky physical offense does seem pretty ridiculous so I wont go there, but I think they would be the most benefited from getting a Slow bulky psynergy offense class.

Seventh: I am sad to see the item classes go, but realistically they were a pain to build around and were mostly too weak to justify using them. Besides, there are just so many options available with the changes you did that I will not miss them.
[/spoiler]

Psynergy changes

Here I'll talk about the psynergy changes. I mostly like the new psynergies, tough they may not really be balanced. Although I understand the spirit behind doing it I didn't like the changes you made to existing psynergy, so I am going to start with that.

[spoiler]
First of all I want to say I understand the motivation behind this change: you want to make good use of every psynergy, every animation, because otherwise your classes end up either with really lousy spells or all having the same old Prism, Plasma, Volcano and Gaia, and some series (like Flame) hit less than half of that so the couldn't compete. Also it would seem like cheaper and weaker spells should be more dmg/PP efficient than the hardest hitter and that wasn't always the case. Finally having all the psynegies standardized like this makes it easier to know the power level of the spell you give to each class, so its easier to balance it out. I understand these factors and I am not strictly against any change to the psynergies, but I don't like the way you chose to do it, so I'll try to explain why and name the elements a rework would need to fulfill for it to be good in my opinion.

First: Spell uniqueness: The original system may have had its flaws but every psynergy felt unique and filled some niche, for the most part there weren't any 2 psynergy lines that were identical in all numbers (with different elements), or even similar and that's great, you were kind of surprised with each power level. Ice is not just the Mercury Thorn, Blast is not just the Mars Growth. Maybe you learn two stages of a new line before you get the second stage of the line you had since the beginning. Each is a distinct line with different stats and are learned at different levels. And I think any rework should strive to maintain that.

Second: Range: In your system you completely ignored the amount of enemies the spells were going to hit. You say Quake Sphere should have the same power and cost as Flare Storm even though the first has a Range of 7 and the second has a Range of 3. That makes no sense, if two spells are similar but one's range is higher than the other then either the cost has to be higher as well or the power has to be lower in order to compensate.

Third: Power Level: you gave some MASSIVE buffs to the first stage of pretty much every single psynergy line. Up to 292% in the case of Quake, that is extremely unbalanced, and for what reason? To make it dmg/PP efficient? I don't think that's a good idea, I would rather have inefficient first stages, efficient second stages and strong but inefficient third stages. You would never use the first stages after you get the second ones anyway.

Fourth: Alternatives There are other ways of keeping a psynergy line entertaining besides raw dmg or PP efficiency. Make them have a chance at lowering Atk, or Res, or maybe they inflict Poison or Delude.

I think you should:

• 1) Change the values for all spells so that no 2 Psynergy lines share all the same numbers, they can coincide in one spot but not all 3. Also remember to take the Range into consideration, higher range requires either higher cost or lower power.
• 2) Have the levels at which new tiers are learned mixed up between all the psynergies of a given element. Not having it so straightforward that Flare<Blast<Fire<Starburst<Juggle<Beam<Volcano. Maybe Tier 2 Fire is stronger than Tier 2 Juggle, but is learned later. Maybe Tier 3 Flare is stronger than Tier 3 Starburst but is learned later (And Flare has range 3, while Starburst has range 7). MIX IT UP
• 3) In the end there will be some Tier 3 psynergies that are weaker than others, you can give those some added effect to keep them interesting
• 4) Keep the first stage of the psynergy lines moslty weak, maybe increase it by 5 or so. Otherwise it breaks early game for no good reason
• 5) There's no reason that Volcano, Prism, Gaia and Plasma have to be the strongest psynergies, they have big ranges, maybe a Range 3 psynergy could be stronger?

That's all I have to say about the reworked psynergies. Now about the brand new ones. I love them, some are really powerfull, especially if you combine them. The only one I'm not sure of how good it is is High Tempo, I'm not sure how impactfull a single target speed boost can be. The ones I'm worried about being too powerful are: Demon Flash (Stronger Fume + Break is nuts), Movilize (Cure Well + Kite, without the drawbacks of using Djinn), and the combination of Asylum+Reanimate (You fell like you'll die this round so you negate all dmg and the instantly revive everyone. Besides 50PP is "pretty cheap" for a full revive)
[/spoiler]

Well, that's all I have to say right now. I hope it helps polish this new gem. Once again, all I said here is my subjective opinion and you are free to disagree with any and all of this.

Cheers!

I used that strategy when I went to the Venus Lighthouse at level 20 to get the Gaia blade before exploring the pirate island  Sweat Drop

How did you even get to Venus at level 20?! You should be like 30 by then 

I used the save and restart one only for Djinn that would escape. Since most of them can no longer do so in the newest patch I don't think I'll ever do it again lol

And "balancing" random encounters post reunion is a bit of an extreme issue. I either ignore it cause you can still only deploy 4 people at the same time, or double all enemy stats cause you have a backup party.

Probably doubling all stats would make it too hard. I would double HP on all post-reunion and maybe increase Agi in some (~50%) and then check how that goes, probably damage still needs to be increased on some endgame enemies, but I wouldn't change it without first trying those other changes. I agree it IS a bit extreme, but otherwise it is just too straightforward and easy.
I think this also would be a nice indirect buff to Ailments. What's the use of sleep or stun or poison when you can kill your enemies before they can attack you? However if the fights were longer it would be more worthwhile.

In the latest patch i had to decrease the size of some enemy groups cause they glitch in a all warrior party comp. It's literally the gba running out of RAM to manage all those sprites, cause warrior sprites are bigger than mages + ivan.

Figures. That's a pity, but it can't be helped

900th post!

WOW Congrats!

I can't check yet because my current save file is right before Moapa, but I think I am not exaggerating that it might be possible to have +30PP/round in the back party (and even higher with end-game equipment)

If you go for the absolute maximum PP/t equipment on a back party of 2 warriors and 2 mages just at reunion you would take:

Warriors:
2x Luna Shield (4PP/t)
2x Crown of Glory (6PP/t)

Mages:
2x Dragon Robe (2PP/t)
1x Spirit Gloves (3PP/t)
2x Mythril Circlet (8PP/t)

So in total that's 43PP/t thought that's min-maxing, maybe don't use that number for balancing.
The same in endgame gear would be:

Warriors:
2x Cosmos Shield (10PP/t)
2x Crown of Glory (6PP/t) Though Millenium Helm (50 max PP) may be better considering class multipliers and passive walking recovery

Mages:
1x Iris Robe (5PP/t)
1x Dragon Robe (2PP/t)
1x Spirit Gloves (3PP/t)
2x Psychic Circlet (12PP/t)

Any:
1x Golden Shirt (3PP/t)
1x Iridial Ring (5PP/t)

For a total of 74PP/t This, again is strict min-maxing.

in random encounters we generally do not need to deal with so frequent AoE healing.

Enemies deal enough damage as they are.

Pick one :P

Initiate a battle, leave only 1 enemy alive, then have everyone in the front party Defend and heal any incoming damage until the back party gets back to full PP

Well, that's a broken strat surely, but I don't think that's something balance should be involved in, it's not something most people playing would do. You exploiting that is entirely on you. If we are going for broken strats there's also the out-of-combat heal efficiency one: Put all djinn on standby except the healer's (all if using items), heal the lower total HPs due to class multipliers and then Set all djinn again to get 100% HP with cheaper heals.

[spot on]

Star Magician has the fame of being the easiest of the secret bosses, but that could be "fixed" with the random encounters "softening" the party up a bit before the actual encounter.

Well, you can always run around in the room before him to regain PP, since it doesn't have random encounters. 

I disagree here. The buff to PP-recovery djinn in combination with PP-recovery on items means that PP is no limitation in the long run. To bring again my above example, for Hard Mode Poseidon I didn't have to use any Psy Crystals or even Mountain Waters; Felix who acted as the main healer has Luna Shield for +4 PP-recov, and Piers was using Ether on cooldown on Felix for about 53PP every 3 rounds. With my current PP pool of 165, that's 30+ rounds before Felix runs dry if spamming Wish Well every round, and for quite a few rounds Felix did something else (like use Wish instead of Wish Well, use Shade, use a summon or simply use his Healing Ring as a substitute of Wish)

You finding a specific strategy that allows you to recover PP constantly through a battle is, I think, good design and good thinking on your part. IMO most boss fights are really well balanced.
My main concern was with dungeons and random encounters. I meant the dungeon difficulty before reunion was OK (and I was thinking before Lemuria, since I was overleveled after that and that may be the reason post Lemuria felt easy to me). Yampi Desert, Air's Rock and Kibombo Mountains + Gabomba are spot on

Also, when I completed Reloaded mod v1.74 less than 2 months ago on Normal Mode, I mentioned that PP was never a limitation after the Reunion exactly because of insane PP-recovery on healers from both equipment and from djinn; the only difficulty stemmed from not being instakilled.

We agree, post Reunion dungeons become trivial and PP is not an issue. If fights were longer you would probably need to heal during the fight and it would overall drain your PP more than you recover. Ideally you should be reaching the Psynergy Stones or the end of the dungeons with pretty much no PP (at the intended lvls, obviously if I am overleveled that's my fault).
In Treasure Island 2nd half I was with lvl 31 Isaac party killing every encounter in 2 turns without ever falling below 75% PP and I wasn't even geared optimally for that. So that's a problem. 

I prefer the solution of more simultaneous enemies, to promote the use of more expensive AoE Psynergy, but I realize that there are technical limitations.

Yeah, I'd love to see more 4 and even 5 enemy fights, but that might not be doable. There's a bunch of stuff I would love to change, but most are impossible to mod and the ones that are possible are changes so big I'm sure Caledor wouldn't agree. It's his property after all, so he gets the final call. 

[can]

WOW, you beat Poseidon in Hard Mode? Kudos to you! That guy would stomp most players.
Giving him Pure Ply might be a bit too much. Imagine him healing 750+ on action. One cast is enough to cover most or all of your damage that turn and get 2 more attacks on your guys, also with 3 actions that's potentially 2250+ on one turn O_O Unless it's a very rare cast, I don't know the % rates

About on-use items, Spirit Ring used to be super OP since it healed for 160hp party wide and if used out of combat it would never break, so Caledor nerfed the healing and the out of combat use, it's still a useful item though. The same thing happens with the Unicorn Ring. I don't know why some on-use items break if used out of combat and some don't, that might be a bug on the base game that we can't fix with our editor. If they were usable out of combat it would make their respective psynergies useless.

-+-+-+-+-+-+-

Considering you go there (or at least you can go there) right after reunion, don't you think the second half of Treasure Island's loot is overtuned? I mean, Iris Robe, Caladbolg, Triton's Ward, Clotho's Distaff, Dark Matter. It's all stronger than what you get in Magma Rock or Mars Tower even though you can get it first. And the enemies there are not so hard that you should first go do Mars Lighthouse either, I could farm them with my lvl 31 Isaac's party getting the Djinn kill on everyone in the second turn and using the second party only for heals.

It should either:
a) Have weaker loot more in line with Magma Rock and Mars Lighthouse, move the better pieces to Mars Lighthouse or other endgame dungeons
or
b) Have way stronger enemies that prevent you from going there (or at least makes it somewhat harder)


Maybe the balancing philosophy post-reunion needs to be addressed. Before reunion balancing most fight to last 2-3 turns is good, because if they were longer you'd run out of PP early and wouldn't be able to complete the dungeon. However post-reunion you get a lot of benefits [spoiler]not just 4 more characters, but new loot options and more importantly Djinn reserves that allow you to have the front 4 in their ideal classes for mobs and the back 4 in any less-than-ideal class that can heal. The back party recovers PP passively from walking and PP/t from gear, and group-wide heals affect all 8 out of combat[/spoiler]
Fights should be more challenging (4~ turns) that way you are swapping regularly. Else you just forget the other party even exists and go on playing with your favourite 4

-I don't think you can add anything in the names or descriptions without it backfiring somewhere. The only reasonable solution would be to make all artifact weapons have the same attribute as their unleash so that you can check it in the status -> equipment page, which I am not against. But I agree with Caledor, there's a lot of information that you would want to know about the equipment and you can't get all of it in game, so you always end up going to the docs anyway. Besides, how often do you rely on unleashes before end-game? When is risking a 30% unleash better than casting an EPA or Djinn?

- About the coins issue, Caledor has said in the past that increasing the buy prince is not a good solution since you sell them back eventually and get most of the gold back, because sell price is 75% of buy price. I don't know if this percentage can be lowered, getting it to 60% would make coins a far more valuable resource, but it would mostly make the beginning and mid game more challenging, once you stop buying regular equipment and start finding lots of artifact gear you just stop spending.

- AFAIK Lure can´t be made into a psynergy because the effect on the Lure Hat is picked from a completely different list than utility psynergy. After reunion you can wear the Lure Hat on some back party member to increase the encounters without losing gear on the front party. The only way to implement it before reunion would be to give that same effect to some other piece of gear, though that would make the Lure Hat not really worth sending over

@Varden: It's a nice idea, but the thing is one can't know for sure if any change to that will result in a bug somewhere without going one by one and playing the whole game, so it's not doable.

@Dark Mits: Managing inventory before reunion is awful, that's true, but there's not much that can be done about it. Your suggestion is actually already a thing, Game Tickets, Lucky Medals and stat items are already considered artifacts and can be sold and re-bought later in the game in the item shop.
Showing the unleash element for every weapon would be awesome, but again there's surely some problem with the compression algorithm that could make bugs pop up anywhere else. On a side note, some weapons have inherent attribute that makes even regular attacks have an element (i.e. Gaia Blade) This can be seen in the status screen for equipment.
Increasing elemental power on every weapon indirectly nerfs staves, maces and mages since it makes warriors better at casting, so it doesn't seem like a good idea, unless you also increased all staves and maces power, but then that would be a nerf to overall difficulty

Hey, It's been some time since I last wrote here. I've been playing some (v. 1.76) and wanted to comment on the level progression. I got to Lemuria at 30 and now I'm at reunion at 34. I'm not surprised I'm overleveled, you said the progression is based on running from many encounters and I almost never do that, also I tend to go for djinn-kills on any monster which increases exp and gold yield, so it was to be expected. What does bother me a bit is that now Isaac's party is lvl 30 so there's a big difference there, I'm used to this though, it happens every time

Edit: turned out it was already up to date, lol.

Oh, I didn't even bother checking, dumb me. That's great though. Im going to translate that page right now. Thanks!

There I did the Psynergy doc, this one was a bit harder, some of those italian names a bit... abstract, but I'm confident in the result. Though that document could really benefit from a make-over.

Why is there an "outdated" page? why not remove it? It's a pity though, that one makes far more sense than the "updated" one.

[i'm also allowing comments on the class doc]

Well, i'm amazed. You commented perfectly all the weapons and armors in less than a day, reporting even a few discrepancies between the docs and the actual rom. Thank you very much for your efforts. Hell, it looks even better than if the name were in english from the start, since a lot of comments (that i wouldn't have enabled otherwise) expand on the abbreviations i used.

So, thanks again. The least i can do is check those discrepancies you meticulously reported on the doc.

Oww, thanks! It's the least I could do as a "thank you!" for such a wonderful hack  It wasn't all that hard, had the Editor in one hand and my spanish on the other, it's close enough  The discrepancies are quite minor, but I didn't want other users being confused by the different numbers

Moreover, since this was such a huge success i'm also allowing comments on the class doc. There's a lot of potential for permanent discussion about very specific things that will simply get buried page after page here. Like commenting "how would you use this" on a class name or "why this stat is lower/higher than the one on X" on stats, or movesets... anything, actually. I just wrote a few comments myself.

This is great! As long as it doesn't rekindle the Jonin is OP discussion amirite?

  Wow, that's some really good resources, that's great. Thanks Caledor!
I've commented the translations on the names and some other things in the weapons page already  I'll probably do the armor one next. Maybe tomorrow.

I'm going to start a new game to try out the latest patch (I played 1.71) but with that tiny change I once mentioned: Fire Breath (Acrobat and Dragon Helm) made into a MT EPA simillar to Shuriken to check that out.

Easiest way to know is to check Garet's Psynergy. If he has Flare it's not patched if he has Blast it is. If you find it's not patched try a different ROM, a USA only ROM. Don't expect the enemies to be uber hard though, its pretty nicely balanced

Wind Seer:
You've been asking for a Venus Hagbone Mace to have extra Power, but there already is Tungsten Mace (Crafted from Golem Core) that has 15  Power, over Hagbone's 12 Power. It does have lower atk (129 vs 143) but if you want it for casting it's good.

You don't like Paladin/Holy knight and I agree, persolnaly, I don't want to use them, but I don't think they are bad classes, they fit their theme very nicely. Also think that Cal rates Def and HP way higher than you or I do, and that is likely not going to change. I think the main issue with these classes is that there isn't really a place where they shine because all the enemies are similarly affected by physical attacks and psynergy attacks; If there was a boss (pre-reunion) that had UBER defense and low resistances (kinda like FF Flans) then you would want to have the guys heal and the girls be in offensive classes with Fume/ Punishment. Thing is if this boss was after reunion, you would probably go full mages.
Other than this you would need some boss with really high atk-based MT (high enough that it makes the mages die in one turn) so that you go full warriors with 2 of them wishing, but that would probably be hard to make work.
Still, it's not a bad strategy to have one of your double Wishing come from a low speed unit, since that way you would heal some of the damage the boss did in this turn, which could save someone. Ex: If the boss does 400dmg three times, its really significant if all of that comes at once (1200 would kill most) or it there is a wish in between (-400-400+500-400=700 final).

I agree that Golden Boots are underwhelming if you compare them to end-game gear, but since you get them so early in the game maybe we should be comparing them to the other alternatives available at that moment? It will be a strict upgrade for anyone using Leather Boots and will remain so through all Eastern Sea up until Contigo. Still, I don't agree that Luck is meaningless unless its capped and it's not true only Angel Mia can reach said cap.

On the Circlets and Dresses I agree completely.

Cal, you are right I made two mistakes. First, I was only considering tri-elemental classes, I didn't give two-elemental enough credit. Second I didn't know Shuriken had been nerfed, in the patch notes for 1.72 and 1.73 it doesn't say it explicitely so I assumed it was unchanged, I guess it falls under "mid-tier psynergies for Ninja" though I wouldn't call it that. I see now it has a x1.0 multiplier. So let's go over these:

First Chaos Lord, for the early game its a really good class, both it and Sun Champion have a lot of uses. Once you get the 6 Djinn that allow you to go Shinobi, Chaos Lord remains the top choice against Poseidon. After that most of the mid-game focuses around multi-target fights and Mars-alligned bosses where Chaos Lord is inferior. You could still use it for specific djinn or Mad Plants, but they aren't hard enough to justify moving all your djinn around and then back, are they?
For end-game Chaos Lord looks like the perfect Unleasher, since PP doesn't matter for that, and it gets bravery to buff his attacks, it is strictly better than Jonin at this since they have the same atk but Chaos Lord has way better surviveability, so you would put him in a (posibly cursed) Crit+atk set to get the perfect crit chance, with the Darksword or Herculean Axe or something.
However, as you pointed out there's the posibility of getting stat capped, so then the highest atk multiplier doesn't matter. If you are aiming for 666 atk it's worth noting that if your Chaos Lord is at 708 atk, him in Warlord would be 666 and Warlord is then strictly superior (Same HP and Def, Higher PP, Agi, Luck and Ward. And having access to 3 EPAs, Bravery, Guard, Cure and better MT psynergies). Likewise if your Chaos Lord is at 687 atk, him in Shogun would be at 666, though it is not as strictly superior since it doesn't have atk buffs himself and has to relly on others for it. Shogun does have improved surviveability over Chaos Lord (and PP and Agi) and access to 3 better EPAs.


Secondly, Shuriken has a 16.6% damage reduction compared to my game. This means it now will (probably) deal less damage than ThunderClap and Punji, encouraging to build your Jonin more on elemental power than attack which is nice, while still having a budget option in Shuriken. Shuriken should also hit lower than for example Warlord's Stone Spire when learned at level 33 against Jupiter Lighthouse enemies or Supernova when leared at level 35 against some Mars-weak enemy. However at end-game if neither is geared for elemental power then Shuriken will outdamage all other warrior classes in MT which if perfect by me Jonin should be the best warrior option in MT and it should be hitting for slightly lower damage than Mage's top-tiers, which it didn't before but it now does.
Against the mid-game Bosses Jonin is still the best against Moapa, since MT any element destroys them, which is fine. Against Karst and Agatio and the Flame Dragons it is no longer the clear choice since x2.0 is still strong but just as strong as Quick Strike and considering elemental power differences possibly as strong as Plume Edge's x1.7

Against Star Magician it used to be that Shuriken could 1-shot some of the Balls, with this change even at 999 atk it is not enough to one shot Refresh Ball, though it IS enough to one shot the Thunder Ball. It is still a good choice, but not as mandatory since it would still need extra damage. Shogun, Warlord and Chaos Lord are all able to oneshot one Ball at a time and are better at dealing with the Magician himself.

Against Sentinel I should add Chaos Lord as an option since Odyssey is a good EPA. But Jonin still remains a solid class 'cause Ward.

So of my previous 6 points 2 fell flat with that change I didn't notice. Sorry. I guess you were somewhat right. I still don't see the need for Jonin to have the highest atk multiplier if it is suposed to be more like a caster but I understand its not really that big of a deal and Shogun/Warlord can't have a higher multiplier because it would make Chaos Lord completely useless.


I noticed you didn't say anything about my proposed change to Fire Breath, you didn't like it?

Hey Cal, you say Jonin has wet tissue defenses even though they are better than what most of the mages get, THIS is NOT bad balance but if THEY can survive then surely so can the Jonin with better multipliers and more defensive equipment options. And in the end staying alive is what matters.

My main issues with Jonin is that there are so many different situations where you would want to use it over other clases:

• Pretty much all the mid-game, from the moment you get the 6 djinn up until end-game. Since you are not stat capped the extra atk and PP go a long way
• All mid-game bosses, except maybe Poseidon. Avimander is easy enough (and alternative setups Protector and Paladin are niche and not really needed) and then Moapa, Karst and Agatio and Flame Dragons all get destroyed by shuriken faster than by ST EPAs. Since Shuriken is 1.2xN°enemies, so with 2 enemies you get 2.4 multiplier, way better than Plume Edge's x1.7 or Quick Strike's x2.0
• Any trash even end-game, since shuriken hits harder than base power psynergies and is cheaper (even against Jupiter Lighthouse resistant enemies my Felix's Shuriken would deal more damage than Guardian Jenna's Mother Gaia or Pure Mage Sheba's Hail Prism even though they had their apropiate elemental power equipment).
• Bosses weak to Venus (namely Sentinel): Since Annihilation is just a more expensive Tyrfing but because Jonin has a higher PP pool it somewhat cancells out. You could consider Shogun Skull Splitter to debuff Defense, but you lose out on the impact/ward utility jonin offers.
• Star Magician: a Jonin with 863 attack (achived by buffs, for example 691 base+25% easily achieved in 1 turn) should one shot Refresh Ball and Thunder Ball (and two shot the others) while damaging nearby targets with shuriken. So potentially one shot two orbs and damage the Magician
• Finally, if you want to run a Hybrid for some reason

While the other clases only shine in really specific Boss fights:

• Warlord in Balrog and thats it
• Shogun in Doom Dragon and Dullahan that hit so hard it may not be a good idea to go Jonin

Most of the Jonin's points are about Shuriken being strong not about the Atk multiplier being too high, but Shuriken would still be strong even if the attack multiplier was way weaker. This presents three separate ways to fix it:

• 1: Really Nerf/Remove Shuriken. This is the easiest one. I wouldn't really like it since I find Shuriken's mechanics very interesting
• 2: Relocate Shuriken /Create Shuriken copies for other clases to use. I already gave some ideas for this, but I do think too many would totally ruin it
• 3: Turn Jonin into a more mage-like class by lowering the Atk multiplier by 15-20% and increasing PP, Luck or Wrd. Shuriken would still be useful in some situations but it would not be as mandatory and it would make other EPAs more desirable against some of the bosses

EDIT: Also, about the Poseidon Instant Death issue. I don't think its a bad mechanic to have Instant Death but it does mean you sometimes have bad RNGs and have to replay the same fight over and over and it can get on your nerves so I understand how Wind Seer feels

LOL I tried to go fight Star Magician right after Isaac's party joined. I got my @#$ handed to me in a plate. So I guess I'll come back latter.

On the Buffs to General: You say you want to change Ice for a higher psynergy, but Ice already has the third highest Base Power (after Frost Card and Prism), if you were to switch it for Cool you'd be losing power (and gaining range). Unless you want to give him Prism? Ray isn't all that weak, it's average but I could see it upgraded to Whirlwind to add a bit more damage and range.

On Jonin: I'd argue Jonin is actually too strong right now having the highest PP, ATK and AGI modifiers available for Felix, Isaac and Garet as well as good EPAs, the only (so far) MT EPA, Thunder Clap being really close to Plasma and Punji being a bit further away but still second in damage after Gaia, while also having access to buffs Impact and Ward. If you were to change anything I would make them more psynergy oriented by decreasing the ATK multiplier a bit, then you could buff the PP or psynergies freely.

EDIT: Shouldn't Shogun have the highest ATK multiplier in the first place? Lava Shower, Rockfall and the debuffs are seldom useful, it has no other utility. It's only role is to spam unleashes or EPAs and it's not even the best at that it's wierd

Oh, that makes sense for Archon, I'm just reaching that point it the game where EPAs begin to have added effects so I'm not all that familiar with these effects. Also I don't use debuffs much since they tend fail me regularily

Both the spread sheet and the editor (at least on my 1.71a) show Holy Knight to have Ply-Wish-Revive, maybe you are confusing with the two-elemental Protector that has similar stats and functionality? And I think the low speed is there so that the heals come in between the enemy's multiple attacks

Well, Piers' Holy Knight, just as the others' Paladin, is pretty straightforward, a highly durable healer and it's better at that than any other: Piers' superior natural bulk and PP, slightly higher HP and PP multiplier while having the same def and wrd, higher natural  Power and access to Remedy and Break all make him better than Felix, Isaac or Garet at the job. Off course there isn't much reason to run this when a lower durably healer can give stronger heals with a larger PP pool and still manage to not die, right?

So the correct way to use Archon is to just cast Guard-Ward-Guard-Ward? If you ask me it's better to have the defensive buffs on different characters so that you can get your defenses up in half the time. I still think giving it Mercury Shuriken would be a good idea, of course changing Froth to something like Tornado would complement this change further.