RECORD OF LODOSS WAR: THE ADVENT OF CARDICE
DreamCast (Japanese Import)
Hints Tips & Tactics
First off this is by no means a complete FAQ/Walkthrough. There are already a couple other FAQs
for this game on www.gamefaqs.com, but I thought that more specific in-depth hints,
explinations, and strategies could be usefull for the people who plan on playing the
recently released US version of this game.
Note: Names are based on the Japanese Katakana. There might be name changes for the US version.
Version history:
Do you honestly care about the version history? No? I didn't think so.
Contents:
I: Level ups
II: Stats
III: Armor, Weapons, & Items
IV: Ancient Words - the power ups of the gods
V: the Dwarf's black-smith shop
VI: General Tips & Strategies
VII: the Dragons - how to beat them and what you get.
VIII: Cardice - compared to the dragons, the dark god sure is a wussy.
I ------------------ LEVEL UPS ---------------------------------------------
Early in the game level ups are really important, but after you get a bit into the game
they just aren't nearly as important as Ancient Words. Why? Because you get the exact same
power ups at lower levels as you do at higher levels. Getting 20HP max bonus is seriously
useful when you're only level 5, but by the time you're level 80 or so and you already have
a few thousand HP the 20HP bonus ain't so useful no mo.
But, the enemies in this game get very tough, very quick, and until you get to level B8 of
the final temple, mithril for your Ancient Words is in a finite short supply. So taking the
time to level up is well worth your while.
- A particular 4 of the 30 Crest temples I found to be exceptional level up spots for
different stages in the game.
#1: ZOMBIE TEMPLE (1 of the 2 hidden temples)
- Located: just north of the graveyard (at the beginning of the game) use Wort's catacombs to
get there. Well worth using up one of your scrolls to unlock the door.
- Level: I stayed here until I was about level 13 or so. These zombies give you considerably
more EXP than any of the other creatures near the beginning of the game.
- Strategy: Walk in the main room a bit to get them all rattled up, then go back to hide in
the doorway (to keep from getting surrounded) and keep slashing and healing away. Leave to
refill your heal bottles/save when you run out of heal potions. Cast your Recall spell just
outside the temple entrace so you can use the main save spot in the Goblin Fort, then use the
return warp spot to go back. Once you get up a few levels, and after you take out the initial
bunch of undead at the doorway feel free to wander further in the main room and take out small
groups and straglers. Be careful not to take on too many at once or let yourself get surrounded
since they can all simultaneously pound on you while you're on the ground and kill you quite
quickly if you're not careful. The red zombie is the boss, so avoid killing him until you've
exhausted all the level ups you plan to get out of this place. In all of the Crest Temples
after you kill the temple boss the rest of the monsters will no longer respawn.
#2: LIZARD KING
- Located: Middel of the swamp area. After you complete the elf forrest quest (with Deedlit
& Parn), go talk to Rusev's mother (that haggered old elf in the tree who gives you the 30crest
quest) and she'll teleport you here. This is the temple where you get the Book that unlocks all
magically sealed doors, replacing the need for scrolls.
- Level: I don't remember exactly, but it's a nice place for level ups around level 20 to 30
or so.
- Strategy: more or less the same strategy you used in the Zombie temple. Rile 'em up, hide
in the door to kill the first bunch of them, then venture in and take out what you can without
getting overwhelmed. Avoid killing the boss, located in the top-left corner, repeat. Note that
if you're not careful these lizards will gang up on you rather quick. Also 2 of the lizard-men
can hit you out of your range: the small green peckers with the long spears, and the blue
wizard lizards can shoot ice balls at you. Use the fences to hide behind if you need to.
#3: GOBLIN MASTER
- Located: bottom left of Wasteland Ruins. On the far side of the bridge in the southwest crap
hole of the world.
- Level: this is a GREAT level up spot for around level 30 to 75 or so. The only problem with
this temple is that it's one of the hardest to even reach. You have to make your way through a
lot of Hammer Bros (Gigans), those 4-armed self-replicating demons, fire-salamanders, and
Golems. The bridge is guarded by big groups of Gigans and I suggest making good use of your
Firewall and Recall spells, trying to take out one or 2 at a time.
- Strategy: This place is one of those 3-room temples where you have to take out everything
in the side rooms before accessing the main room. Getting up to this temple is a challenge
but once inside it's actually kind of easy. Do be mindful of your energy though 'cause the
boss is a heavy hitting Golem, and there are goblin wizards that can shoot you from a distance,
as well as lil' goblins that throw axes at you. The strategy is simple, go to either side room,
take out the wizards first, dodging their fire if you can, stand your ground and take out the
larger goblins, then finish off the room with all the lil' pecker goblins.
The larger "flying-ace-looking" goblins are the ones you get the massive, and I do mean
massive, EXP from. You can get up to 2 level ups on a single run through this temple. After you
take out the side rooms, run up and take out all the goblins in the main room, keeping your
distance from the Golem boss as best as possible. There's one larger goblin near the left that
sometimes doesn't appear until after you've already taken out a few of his buddies (Probably a
glitch, I don't know).
#4: SANDWORM
- Located: near the bottom of the desert.
- Level: 75 or so - 99(max) Don't even attempt taking on this temple until you're at least
level 70 (or higher, don't give up on the Goblin Master temple too soon) and have powered up
on a lot of ancient words.
- Strategy: These worms give you the best EXP out of any of the basic monsters in the 30
temples, but they will beat you down HARD if you're not powerful enough to take them. There
are 2 basic strategies for killing these worms, the first is bit more cautious and sane, the
2nd will kill 'em faster, but is highly prone to running yourself into a wormy death.
- First: head left from the door, walking slowly, swinging wide, and keeping an eye out for
approaching worms. Once you play through it a few times, you'll get a feel for where they
generally appear. When one comes bounding through the sands stop walking and let it come to
you, otherwise you might activate a 2nd worm and find yourself in a world of hurt. Get up next
to it and keep whacking away until it goes down, paying close attention to your health. Then go
out and find the next worm. If they start jumping around a lot and knocking you down then just
try to get next to where it keeps coming out of the sand and start hitting it, they'll usually
stay put if you're right next to them. If you get 2 worms on you at once, either try finishing
off the one with the least energy before the other can do too much damage to you (if you feel
brave), run the hell back to the entrance and just redo the temple, or die.
- Second: Give yourself some yellow ancient words, accessories, and what-not to get your MP
and magic power up. Enter the temple, at all times keep track of where you are in relation
to the door, and go round them doggies up. Run wide and hard trying to pick up as many worms
as possible to follow you, stopping for nothing. Do not get too close to any of them, and do
NOT let them block off your rout back to the door. If you allow even one of them to knock you
down, then forget it, you're dead. Lead the herd back to the entrance of the main room. Stand
in the entrance so that you're out of their reach, but they're not out of reach of your spells,
then fire-wall the hell out of them. It doesn't take many fire-walls to kill 5 or 6 at a time
this way. If you have enough MP left and are feeling lucky, go ahead and round up a 2nd herd.
Use this same fire-wall strategy to kill the boss (the huge Dune-looking worm that shoots
sand-waves) after you've maxed out at level 99.
II -------------- STATS -----------------------------------------------------------
You actually have several different status screens. One for your overall stats, and one
for each of the items that you have equipped. The main status screen displays the cumulative
stats for all of your level ups, equipment, and ancient words combined. The item specific
status screens will display what each item is contributing, as well as displaying which yellow
Ancient Words you have equipped.
For stats with Letter displays, here are the rank of the letters from bad to good: E D C B A S.
S is the best you can possibly get in that category. Why S is better than A I don't know, maybe
it stands for Super or something...those wacky Japanese.
MAIN STATUS SCREEN:
The first 3 stats don't actually change your character's power/abilities, but rather affect the
other stats.
STR - Strength - affects DMG and IMP
DEX - Dexterity - affects SPD (and maybe something else?)
INT - Intelligence - affects MAG and MP
HP / MP - you don't have any INT if you can't figure these out.
DMG - damage - the damage you inflict on enemies
IMP - impact - how hard or strong you swing. IE: how much you make enemies reel-back when you
hit them, or out-right knock them down.
CRIT % - Critical percentage - percentage of performing an extra-damaging critical
attack. Note: 100% is not the max, in fact, some enemies have a critical-resistance so
a 100% CRIT rate won't result in a critical hit 100% of the time.
CRIT ( ) - Critical multiplier - multiply this number by your DMG points for how much damage
you dish out when you perform a critical hit.
AR - armor - your basic armor rating
DUR - Durability - how well you can withstand enemy attacks. VERY important defensive stat.
Determines how well you can stand up to heavy blows. IE: lower DUR means you fall on
your duff more when you get hit, higher DUR means you can keep standing (and swinging)
while getting hit by more powerful attacks.
PAR - Parry - I suppose how well you can dodge attacks, but I'm not sure. I didn't even bother
with this stat untill I ran out of other Ancient Words to pump up. (mainly because I was
using double-handed weapons through most of the game and PAR is mainly a shield stat.)
MAG - Magic - how powerful your spells are (how much HP your towers/walls/cages have, what
level creatures you can resurrect, how much damage your offensive spells do, and possibly
how well you can resist enemy magic, but I'm not too sure on that last one)
HEAR - Hear - how well you can hear enemies, which as far as I can tell doesn't make much
difference until you get it up to S, and then you can see lil' blue waves where
out-of-sight enemies are. Not too important.
STEP - Step - how loud your steps are. The noise level you make as you clomp around the screen.
A rating of S will make your foot steps totally silent, which means that enemies will
have to actually see you to be alerted to your presence.
MITH - mithril - the money of the game
THE 4 COLORED ORBS - (Magic Resist Box) - resistance to certain types of spells.
Black: Resist Dark / Red: Fire / Green: Earth or Sand / Blue: Water or Ice
THE 4X4 BOXES - (Specialty abilities) - these 16 boxes will display the symbols of any special
abilities you currently have (no, I don't know what the different symbols stand
for). I've found that a lot of the special ability symbols are mixed blessings,
like the fire-sword one is good against ice-monsters but makes you deal only 1
point of damage to fire-monsters, and another increases your damage against
enemies but drains your HP with every hit.
WEAPON STATUS SCREEN:
LONG - the length or reach of your sword.
SPD - speed - the speed of your swing. This makes a huge difference in how quickly you can do
hit & run attacks, and how many hits you can dish out in between each enemy attack. Don't
even try to use a weapon slower than B.
SGL / DBL - Single or Double - You can only have a shield equipped (as well as the shield's
ancient words) if you're using a Single handed weapon (SGL). DBL weapons usually
have higher DMG and IMP than SGL, but pay attention to SPD, and CRIT too.
ANCIENT WORD SLOT - displays currently equipped yellow ancient word.
ARMOR/HELMET/SHIELD:
PRV - prevent - prevent some damn thing, I'm not even sure. Maybe prevent damage, I don't know
REG - Regenerate - how fast you recharge HP.
CHG - Charge - how fast your recharge MP.
MANA - mana - ???
RESIST BOX:
R.CR - Resist Critical - your resistance to receiving critical attacks from enemies. Not an
important stat.
III --------------- WEAPONS, ARMOR, & ITEMS -------------------------------------------
The first important thing to note about equiping Weapons and Armor is that weapons, suits of
armor, helmets, and shields should NEVER be equiped on the battle field. When you find a weapon
or armor just hold on to it untill you warp back to the Goblin Fort. There, sell them to the
black-smith dwarf so you can combine them with ancients words. If you equip them on the field
you'll loss the bonuses of the ancient words that you've put into your currently equiped items.
More on ancient words and the Dwarf in section IV.
Capes, boots, bracelets, belts, earrings, and neclaces can't be imbued with ancient words, so
if you find something better feel free to equip at will. Do note though that certain accesories
are better in certain situations, so it's sometimes worth keeping old items to store in the
Dwarf's chest for later use.
Example: for most the game you'll want to have bracelets that increase either HP, DMG, or STR.
But, in certain areas it's better to equip bracelets that boost MP, INT, or MAG, so keep
them in storage to be pulled out when needed, rather than throwing them away and wishing you
had kept them later. It holds a lot (more than you might think), but your storage chest does
tend to get really cluttered after a while, so it is a good idea to do some spring cleaning
every once in a while to be rid of any lower-powered items that just don't have any value any
more.
The 2nd thing to note about equiping weapons & armor is that different equipment not only have
their own basic stats, but the affect of Ancient Words also varies from item to item.
Example: imbuing your weapon with a Damage+6 Ancient Word will increase one weapon's DMG by 6,
another by 3, and another by 12. Or imbueing your helmet with an Intelligence+2 will increase
the INT of one helmet by 0, another by 1, and another by 4.
***
To answer your question now: Yes, imbueing one weapon (or armor) with an ancient word will
affect ALL the weapons (or armor) you've sold to the Dwarf. When you pick a new weapon
(or armor) from the list you're melding it with ALL the Ancient Word powers that you've ever
given to previous weapons (or armor). That's the whole reason for not equiping new weapons and
armor untill after you've sold them to the Dwarf. Also this is the reason why in your status
screen the names of your weapons & armor will be displayed as "[given name] + #". This +#
tells you the total number of ancient words you have in your weapon, armor, helmet, or shield.
***
3rd, each set of armor as well as your weapons have Ancient Word slots. These slots are
10 blocks, some of which may be filled in with a grey block. The empty blocks (the same color
as the surrounding background) are the blocks that Ancient Word symbols can take up. IE: if
your weapon has 7 free blocks (the other 3 are filled in) then only ancient words with a total
symbol length of 7 or less may be forged or equiped on that weapon.
IV --------------- ANCIENT WORDS ----------------------------------------------------
You've heard about them, now learn what they do.
Ancients Words are the primary means of status boosters and power ups in this game.
You obtain Ancient Words by reading the various tablets scattered through out the land. The
tablets are placed just about every where so take the time to search every lil' nook and crany.
Once you've read (clicked on) a tablet the Dwarf will automatically have that Ancient Word
in his list back at the Goblin Fort.
Note: Your Wepaon, Armor, Helmet, and Shield each have their own seperate set of Ancient Words.
There are 2 types of Ancient words: White and Yellow.
- WHITE ANCIENTS:
These are the primary type and the ones that you have to pay the dwarf to forge
into your weapons and armor. Their effects are cumulative and permanent. You're only
allowed to use up so many of each Word though. The max number of times you're able to use that
particular Word is displayed to the right of the Word in the Dwarf's list.
Example: "Damage+6 5/12" means that you can forge the Damage+6 Ancient Word into your weapon a
total of 12 times, and that you've already done so 5 times.
When there is a star for the number (damage+6 */12), this means that you've maxed out that
particular Ancient Word. The color of the Ancient will also turn blue after you've used it up.
Some times maxing out an Ancient Word is the only way to unlock the next highest Ancient.
Example: Once you've maxed out Damage+7 (Damage+7 */12), Damage+8 will be available for use.
The mithril cost for forging a certain ancient word will go up with each use.
Example: the first time you use Armor+4 it will cost say 100 mithril, the 2nd time 150, the 3rd
time 200, and so on.
This means that for sake of conserving Mithirl which, as I said, is in a finite short supply
for the bulk of the game, it's best not to concentrate on a single Ancient Word. If there are
other Ancient Words of the same type available then it's in your best interests to use the most
cost-efficent choice possible.
Example: Armor+4 is now costing you 200 to use, but Armor+5 hasn't been used at all yet and it
only costs 220 to use the first time. Now you're better off using Armor+5 a couple of times
until it becomes too expensive and Armor+4 is the more cost efficient choice again.
Basic economic math really. Don't look at the total price, but how much each point of that
attribute bonus will cost as compared to other Ancient Words of the same attribute.
- YELLOW ANCIENTS:
Yellow Ancients will be listed after all of the White Ancients. Unlike White Ancients, Yellow
Ancient Words are free, you can never use them up, and the effects are temporary. Yellow
Ancients are equipped instead of forged. Their effects are considerably more substansial than
any single White Ancient Word, but the affects only last for as long as you have them
equipped. To equip a Yellow Ancient just select it from the list in the Dwarf's shop and it
will automatically be equipped.
You can only have one Yellow Ancient Word equipped on each item at a time (for a total of 4
possible Yellow ancients equipped at any one time between your weapon, armor, helmet, and
shield).
The Yellow Ancient will stay equipped until you de-select it from that item's Ancient list.
Since you can only have one Ancient Word selected at a time per item, you can't have a Yellow
Ancient equipped while you're forging a White Ancient into that item. It will also be removed
if you change (Transform in the Dwarf's shop) the weapon or armor that the Ancient Word was
equipped to. If you've unequipped a Yellow Ancient Word then just get back into the proper
Ancients list and select it again before you go back out to take on the world.
The effects of Yellow Ancients may not be readily visible when you select them from the Dwarf's
lists of Ancients. In particular there's a Yellow Ancient Word for your suit of armor that
increases your DMG, but you can't see your DMG rating while on the armor status screen. Also
there's an Ancient for your weapon that tripples your HP while halving your MP, but there is no
HP or MP display on your weapon's status screen. This has to be the single most usefull ancient
in the game. It will tripple the HP bonuses of ALL your items as well as your base HP. If
needs be, you can always make up for the MP loss with a Yellow Ancient for you Helmet or an MP
increasing neclace or bracelet.
Ancient Symbols:
For both types of Ancient Words there will be a description of the attribute bonus that Word
will give you, as well as a set of 10 blocks that contain a number of archaeic symbols. These
symbols are supposed to be the word itself (in some ancient tongue) and they do actually have
an importance. That is you cannot forge a White Ancient Word or equip a Yellow Ancient Word
that takes up more blocks that what your current weapon or armor allows. This is particularly
important for Yellow Ancient Words, because if you want to equip an ancient word for your
sword that takes up 8 blocks, but you only have 7 free, then you're out of luck. Either change
weapons or pick a different Yellow Ancient to equip.
For White Ancients it's not as important since imbued ancient words carry over from weapon to
weapon and armor to armor. As long as you've sold a weapon (or armor) to the dwarf that has
enough free blocks, you can just temporarally swith to that weapon (or armor), forge the
ancient, then switch back again.
V -------------- THE DWARF'S BLACK-SMITH SHOP --------------------------------------
Now how in the farkin-A do you even use the Ancients that you've obtained. Go see the Dwarf
my son. The Dwarf smithy is your bestest buddy in this game. He's the guy in that building
on the right of the Goblin Fort making all that clanking noise, who you rescued and named
early on. He's the guy who forges White Ancients, equips Yellow Ancients, makes keys
and mithril picks, and who you sell all your armor and weapons to.
Whenever you talk to him he'll bring up a list of things to talk about, select the top one
to get into the main forging screen. In this screen, which you will see a lot of in this game,
there are six options to choose from: Refine, Select One, Transform, Ancients, Duplicate, &
All List.
Lets go through them in order of importance. In all these screens A selects and B cancels.
REFINE - Sell any weapons, suits of armor, helmets, or shields that you have in your
current inventory. This is the first step nessisary for forging or equiping ancient
words, as well as a source of income for you.
Note: the first set of armor and sword you get in this game you can't sell, since
theoretically this is the equipment that you'll forge into all of your other weapons
and armor along with all of your Ancient Words.
SELECT ONE - Here you will select either your weapon, armor, helmet, or shield. You need to
do this to select which equiped item you either want to imbue/equip an Ancient
Word to, or which item you want to change into something else while keeping
your Ancients in-tact.
TRANSFORM - After you've selected which piece of equipment you want to change (IE: to equip a
different sword or set of armor), select this option. This will bring up a list of
posssible choises for equipping a new item. The stats shown are those of what each
item will be with all the of the bonuses from the Ancient Words. When you equip
(transform) a new item all of the White Ancient Words you've forged into the
previous items will carry over to this new item. This is why it's so important to
sell your items to the Dwarf before you epuip them.
The "Content" will be the mithril cost of switching to that new item. If the number
is positive you have to pay to switch equipment, 0 it's even, and negative you get
mithril back.
You can choose to name/change the name of any of the new items you equip.
ANCIENTS - After you've selected the item you want to use, this is the screen you go to to
forge/equip ancient words. A list of the ancient words for that item will be brought
up as well as a status screen for that item. To select the Word you want press A. If
the Word's symbols are less than 1/2 the free Ancient Word blocks available for that
item you can select the Word twice to forge it twice at the same time (usefull for
smaller stat boosters). Note: once a Word is selected all of the Words turn grey to
denote that a Word is in use and no other words can be selected at that time.
Selecting a Word will show you the change that it will make on your stats if forged.
To deselect a Word press Y. L or R will move the list over.
After a Word is selected press X to get into the Word forging screen. Press Y to
exit the forging screen. Press A to forge (fuse/imbue) the Word into that item.
You can keep forging the Word until either your mitrhil runs out, or until you reach
the max number for that Word. Each time your forge a Word your displayed stats will
change to show what affect will be made if you forge that Word again.
Fusion: Current cost of forging the selected Ancient Word.
Content: Value of currently equipped item you have selected.
Mithril: Current amount of mithril you have available.
Some times when you max out the number of times you can forge the selected Word a
message will pop up that you have unlocked the next higher Word for that attribute.
DUPLICATE - Select this to make copies of Keys or Mithril Picks. Keys cost 5 per copy & and
Mithril picks cost 20. As long as you have the mithril you have an unlimited
supply of keys & Picks this way. You can't copy Mithril Picks until after you've
initially obtained them in the Black Dragon's cave. You can also make extra copies
of your weapons and armor but I really don't see why you ever would.
ALL LIST - Displays a list of all the Ancient Words you've collected for all 4 items.
VI ------------- GENERAL TIPS & STRATEGIES ---------------------------------------------
Miscellaneous tips and tricks I picked up while playing the game.
- 1 - DURABILITY:
I can't stress enough how important this defensive stat is.
The primary way that you're going to die in this game is by getting knocked down by some enemy,
then getting ganged up on by all surrounding enemies kicking you while you're down and keeping
you from being able to get back up to cast a spell or defend yourself in any way.
..in fact, about 90% of the times you die in this game will be for this reason.
BUT
With high Durability you eliminate, or at leaste lessen, this problem and hence stay alive a
helluva lot longer.
Your DUR rating is practically more important than your AR rating. ALWAYS select the Armor with
the highest durability, even if it means sacrificing AR or HP. As soon as you get the Durabilty
Ancient Word, spend every bit of mithril you have maxing that sucker out.
Trust me, a high DUR rating makes this game massively easier.
By the time you get to the final temple you should have a high enough DUR rating that Mithril
Golems, the 2 Dragons, Puddle Queens, and those lava-blobs are the only things that can knock
you down anymore. By the time you get to Cardice, the Dragons and Puddle Queens are the only
things that should even be able to make you reel-back from hits.
I don't remember the exact numbers but I think I had a DUR rating of 400 or so when I was done
maxing out the Durability Ancient Word (combined with the right Armor) and of 600 or so when I
first fought Cardice.
"Durability is the all seeing, all knowing defensive stat of the world."
- 2 - SAVES:
Use multiple saves and save often. That seems so basic, but it's still important. Make
liberal use of that Recall spell to warp back to the Goblin Fort to save, refill health
potions and whatever. Just devote an entire VMU to this game while you're going though it.
Do note that the Sega brade 4X memory cards don't work with in-game saves for Lodoss War.
They can be used to load saves and for back-up saves, but not to be saved to while playing.
- 3 - SPELLS:
Fire Wall: (2nd level Fire)
VERY usefull offensive spell. Cast it and hide, cast it and run, cast it while hiding,
cast it while running, cast it to back up your regular attacks...usefull in many boss
situations.
Take the gold Gigan Death temple-boss for example: First take out enough of his hammer-bro
underlings along the top of his cave to have a clear path to the boss and back to
the door. Then entice the Gold Gigan (some of his guards will probably follow) over to the
door and slam it in his face. Gigans are too stupid to know how to open doors. Stand below
the door and back a little, just out of reach of the shock waves from his hammer, but close
enough for your Fire Walls to reach just beyond the other side of the door. heh. Have your
MP and MAG up really high, and Fire Wall away. You might have to burn up a couple of his
guards before he's the one who's standing next to the door, but after a number of Fire
Walls the bad-boy goes down and you never even had to bring yourself close enough to him
to take a single point of damage.
Gust: (2nd level Wind)
This spell is quite handy when you need to give yourself a break from enemy attacks
or to just run away. This spell will knock down every enemy on the screen (in the
dirrection that you aim it). Some high level enemies won't be effected, but when you're
getting surrounded it can give you the extra second you need to get the hell out of there.
Vortex (3rd level Wind) is a good offensive spell that's nessisary for the final
section of game.
Acid Fog: (3rd level Curse)
the only thing that makes this spell good is the range. It's really weak, but
comes in handy in a couple places in the final temple since it can hurt enemies that
aren't even on the screen yet. Otherwise the "curse" spell set is worthless.
Tower, Wall, & Cage: (Stone spell set)
Don't underestimate the value of a good defensive spell. Tower prooved
invaluable when fighting the first mini-boss (the 4-armed demon in the elf temple). Most
enemies are too stupid to know how to walk around things, so if you cast a Wall or Tower
and position yourself behind or slightly to the side of it, they'll concentrate on tearing
down the wall rather than trying to go directly after you. As a bonus if your sword has a
Length of about 1.8 or higher then you can whack enemies on the other side of the wall,
but they can't hit you. Wall and/or Cage are NEEDED as protection against the many
Medusa's in the final temple. If you know you're going up against multiple Medusas, always
have one of these 2 spells ready to go.
Animate, WonderDead, ControlDead: (Resurrection spell set)
Good when you want to resurrect a whipping boy to draw some enemy fire off of you.
Mirror, Ghost, Invisible: (Coward spell set)
Absolutely worthless. I suppose if you have a Step of S then Invisible might work, but
otherwise I've never gotten these spells to do a damn thing for me.
- 4 - MEDUSAS:
Unholy crap do hate I Medusas.
These are hands-down the biggest pain-in-*ss monsters in the game. Taking on one Medusa at
a time isn't so bad, since there's a long enough pause inbetween each of their stone shots
for you become flesh again and dodge the next shot.
BUT
If two or more Medusas converge on you at the same time, and one of them turns you to stone
then the other one is going to turn you to stone, then first one again, then the 2nd one, then
the first one, and you may as well go back on your save now 'cause you just got yourself into
an infinite loop of being petrified and there's not a damn thing you can do about it. What
makes them even more fun is that they can shoot at you from off-screen. The only defense you
have against this are your Wall and Cage spells: block one while killing the other.
- 5 - FINAL TEMPLE, FlOORS B6 - B8:
These are the official power-up areas of the game.
B8 is particularly usefull for gaining quick and easy mithril over and over again. You should
get around 50,000 mithril (give or take) every time you make a run through this floor.
After clearing the bulk of the Final Temple you'll find yourself on floor B9 (bypassing for
the most part B6 - B8). Here you'll find a save spot and the boss Karla. Karla is
pathetically easy, so just kill her and be done with it. After you kill her, a permanent
warp back to the Goblin Fort opens up. You will use this warp many, many times. A quick walk
up and right from the warp is the staircase to B8, which is where you will spend the most
of the last remaining hours of the game: gaining mithril as well as powerful new items,
epuipment, and spell scrolls that the enemies will randomly drop. The items will stay where they
fell even after you telport back to the Goblin Fort so you can pick them up on you next
Mithril Run if you don't currently have enough inventory space. Remember to pick up everything,
even if you already have that particular weapon or armor, since the high-level equipment will
fetch a good price from the Dwarf.
- B8 is the power-up floor that you have been waiting for the entire game. At the Dwarf's shop
fill up your entire inventory with Mithril Picks and your six item-slots with heal potions,
save, take the warp back to B9, go mithril mining on B8, use Recall when you're out of
picks...repeat MANY times over. As long as you use the permanent warp on B9, the mithril
crystals and enemies will come back every time.
- There are plenty of medusas on B8, but ONLY near the top of the floor and far away from most
of the mithril deposits. If you take the proper path through the level you'll only ever have
to deal with at most 2 or 3, and they appear in the same place every time so quickly tossing
up a cage to defend yourself is pretty easy.
- Find a good path in the lower ice-caves from the middle-left to the lower-right parts of the
floor, then make your way to the center and go straight up out of the caves to the ice fields
(with the cracks in the ground). There, you should find the last few deposits of mithril to use
your picks on. After you're out of the ice caves and in the Ice fields there shouldn't be any
reason for you to go too far left or right, unless you're headed for the staircase to B7 which
is in the top right corner.
- Once you learn where the mithril usually shows up, you can easily use up all of your mithril
picks before you ever have to deal with any medusas. Mithril crystals will appear in the same
place every time, but it's random as to whether or not they'll be there every time you make
your mithril run.
- The other enemies on B8 are pretty easy: the ice demons re-spawn so don't spend much time
on them. In the Ice Caves there are groups of Centaur Demons near the middle-left and of
Lesser Demons in the bottom-right whose off-colored leaders will drop an item every time.
There's a wandering off-colored 4-armed Demon near the middle of the Ice-caves who also
drops an item every time you kill it. You should never even see the lizards in the far-left
of the ice-fields unless you're just exploring. Vortex can come in handy if you're having
problems with the groups of Lesser Demons.
B7 & B6 can also be used for gaining mithril, but I don't suggest it since the mithril
deposits are few and far inbetween, and best of all the floors are littered
with medusas that pop back to life about 20 seconds after you kill them...but if you want
to kill the Dragons, you will have to brave these two floors from start to finish.
VII -------------- THE DRAGONS -------------------------------------------------
Yes, contrary to popular belief, the Dragons can be defeated. I managed to kill both of
those scaly bastiches(without the aid of any sorts of cheats), and I can tell you how.
- 1st - Powering up:
That floor B8 I mentioned was good for obtaining copious amounts of mithril...well you're
going to spend a good 10+ hours repeatedly making mithril runs through that place, so get
used to it. AR, HP, DMG, STR, Fire Resistance, SPD, pump them all up.
DUR actually doesn't matter much since they'll knock you down reguardless. MP and MAG don't
mean a damn thing in these battles.
- 2nd - Protection from the Dragons:
Don't attempt to take on the Dragons unless you have a MINIMUM of 20,000HP. I had around
30,000HP give or take (the display maxes out 9,999 so it's hard to tell exactly) when I
killed the green dragon.
The only way to obtain HP this high is with that "tripple HP 1/2 MP" Yellow Ancient Word for
the sword.
Fire Resistance. They're Dragons. They breath Fire. You want to make yourself take as
least damage from fire as possible. I actually passed up the Fire Resistance Ancient Word
some where in this game, but I used a Cape, Armor, and Neclace that really boosted my Fire
Resistance to make up for it.
If I remember right, when I beat the Green Dragon I had an AR rating of lil' over 2,000 and
a Fire Resistance of 70 or so, but if you can help it, I suggest getting your Fire Resistance
higher than that. Greeny was doing around 4,400 points of damage per fire-ball to me at the
time...or maybe it was 2,400...it's been so long I forget, but suffice to say, even with stats
that high the Dragons dish out some serious pain.
- 3rd - Damaging the Dragons:
Use the Dragon Sword for one. Wearing damage-enhancing bracelets also helps, as does maxing
out all your DMG and STR Ancient Words. Most important, max out the "UINGUBASUTAA" (Wing
Buster) Ancient Word for the Sword.
The Wing Buster? How's this supposed to help me?
Well the Buster Ancient Words increase damage done to that type of monster, right?
yes.
Dragons have wings, don't they?
yes.
So this Wing Buster will greatly increase the damage I do to Dragons?
yes, yes it will.
Like all enemy-specific Buster Ancients for the Sword, this one maxes out at 99, so
it'll take a while, but don't expect to kill the Dragons without it.
- So where do I get this blessed Wing Buster?
Remember how I mentioned that if you want to beat the Dragons you have to brave the floors
B7 & B6 from start to finish? Think there's a connection? If I remember correctly, and I
believe I do, The Wing Buster tablet is in the far top right corner of floor B6. It's the
final prize at the far end of a long maze of heavily guarded tunnels. The entrance from B7 to
B6 is on the right-hand side of B7, and is guarded by a worm-boss that gives you the 3rd level
Fire spell when you defeat it. You will have to work your way through throngs of regenerating
Medusas, Puddle Queens, Gigan Deaths, Greater & Lesser Demons, Fire Salamanders, Mithril
Golems, and those pudgy flying dragons. But if you can't handle these monsters, what makes you
think you could possibly take on the Dragons?
Using the Dragon Sword and a maxed-out Wing Buster, I was doing 78,800 points of damage per
hit against the Green Dragon. Against the Black Dragon it was 10,000 - 15,000 less.
Do these numbers seem kind of high to you? Well considering the Dragons both have around
150,000,000 HP (a ROUGH guesstimate), give or take 50,000,000 or so, you bloody well
better be dishing out some serious damage with each it. Considering they take a few
thousand HP out of you with every hit of their fire balls, in rapid succession, you bloody
well better have some seriously high HP and the defenses to back it up.
- 4th - Battle Tactics:
I do suggest taking on the Green Dragon first. He is the weaker of the 2 and he'll help you
power up for the battle against the Black Dragon. In the Green Dragon's desert there's a
tablet you can read. You can quickly click on it as you pass by, but I'm not sure what it
even does, if anything (I'm not so good with reading Japanese). Use the exact same strategy
against both Dragons.
First of all when the Dragon is flying around, stay out from under it or it could land
on you. You can't hurt it while it's up there so just keep dodging the fire and trying to
position yourself so you'll be near its neck when it lands. It's best to leave some distance
between you and the dragon so you have more room to manuver when it lands.
When it does land you have to get near its head to get it to breath fire at you, then high
tail back to its side and swing at its wing, moving with the beast as it spins around to try
and hit you with its fire breath.
You can't just try to stay near the back-side of the Dragon and hit it without having to deal
with its fire attacks. If you try to hurt it without it being able to hurt you, then
it'll just take off into the air again befor you can hit it. Stay near the front end, and
when it charges up its fire run over to its wing and do what you can to dodge and damage.
If you get directly infront of the beast it might head-butt you and knock you down. This
doesn't do any damage, and it can help keep it from using its fire attack if you start out in
a bad position when it lands. The only problem with its head-butt attack is that it's
annoying and if you let it push you back against a wall you can get cornered and burned to
a toasty crisp. To avoid this just stay around the center of the arenas, which is easy
enough since they're both huge.
If you want, you can use up some invincibility postions to help you out, but don't rely on
them, since you only collect about 5 through out the entire game, and they don't last long.
You'll exhaust your supply long before you do any substantial damage.
- 5th - Prizes:
Green Dragon:
After you get a number of hits in on the Dragon he will start radomly filling up your
inventory with new items for every set of hits you land on him. This means every so-many
seconds pause to check your inventory so you can throw away the useless crap to make room for
the next set of items he's going to drop. Any and every Weapon, Armor, Helmet, and Shield he
gives you THROW AWAY, even if they have a big "NEW" marked over them. Trust me, just pitch
them all since they take up too much space in your inventory and you have no reason to
keep them anyway. He will give you sets of "+15" accesories (the most powerfull in the game),
fully charged large and medium health potions, new capes, various potions, etc. You have
a chance of randomly getting any item in the game, even some copies of those 30 Temple
Crests, which is really annoying since you've already gotten to the Green Dragon so they no
longer have any purpose, and you can't throw them away.
After he's dead, the elf hag will kill herself, or maybe her magic back-fires, I don't know,
but it's fun watching her die. Then go back to the Dwarf's shop to get your Dragon Killing
Prize. When you walk into the shop you'll notice something...all the weapon/armor racks are
full. Hmmm, I didn't have all these sets of armor before. Talk to the Dwarf: you now have
every weapon and every set of armor in the game, which is why I told you to throw away any
weapons and armor that the Dragon may give you dirrectly. Why let them take up space in your
inventory when they're all going to appear for use in the Dwarf's shop anyway?
Black Dragon:
Your prize for defeating the most bad-*ssed powerfull boss in the game, who's actually one of
the most powerfull bosses in the whole of video game history prooves the makers of this game
have a sense of humor.
The death of the Green Dragon provides you truck-loads of items and prizes.
That must mean the death of the Black Dragon provides you with...every remaining Ancient Word
you haven't yet collected? That would have been good. No, no, he doesn't give you that.
Unlocks a "Hard" skill level mode so you can go through the game again with even more
challenge? That would have been really cool, but no, no, he doesn't give you that.
So what does he give you?
Well, and I bet you wished you had this BEFORE you took on the Dragons, he gives you the
Dragon Buster Ancient Word.
That's right, he gives you the Ancient Word that allows you to dish out maximum damage
against all dragons...except...wait...both the dragons are already dead...so...I just beat
the most unholy excessively powered up boss I've possibly ever gone up against, and what do
I get...the most useless item I could possibly get at this point in the game.
Ah well, after you kill the Green Dragon and get a bunch of Large Health Potions out of him
you want to put them to use for something, and the Black Dragon is the only thing left, so you
may as well kill it just for the sake of beating every boss in the game. Besides,
nothing beats the satisfaction you get from killing such an ancient and noble creature.
VIII -------------- CARDICE ------------------------------------------------------
Compared to the Dragons, Cardice may be a wimp, but compared to everything else in the game
he/she/it is a super-powered bad-*ss. After you kill the wimp Karla, you're free to walk
through the doors on the right-hand side of B9 and make your way to the final boss battle.
Don't expect an easy battle against the god and her demonic hordes unless you've spent a good
amount of time on that floor B8 gaining mithril and collecting powerful accesories
POWER UPS AND PREPARATIONS:
- Use Ancient Words to get all your basic stats up. You'll want to have high attack power for
all of the demonic underlings you'll be fighting in this final area as well as high Magic
Power for Cardice herself.
- A sword with an SPD of S is really handy. For me, that Light-Saber looking sword with the
really high CRIT rate was the weapon of choice for the final area. At the very leaste you'll
want to use a Single Handed sword so you can use the Ancient Word bonuses from the shield.
- I HIGHLY recommend powering up the "Demon Buster" Ancient Word for the sword. With the sole
exception of a few Mithril Golems, every monster you have left to kill in this game is in
the Demon character class, and this ancient word will greatly increase the amount of
damage you deal to them. Over 100,000 points of damage per hit if you max it out. Best of
all, Medusas are considered demons so it works against them too.
- Use that "tripple HP 1/2 MP" Yellow Ancient for the Sword (which should be standard practice
by now). You'll want to have good MP and MAG for the final battle, so use a Yellow Ancient
for the Helmet that increases MP, MAG, or INT to make up for loss of MP from the sword.
- For the first part of the final area you'll want to equip a belt that raises either your HP
or your AR, Bracelets that raise your DMG or STR, and a necklace that raises your general
stats.
- Keep a 2nd set of bracelets and a neclace in your inventory to switch over to when you
fight Cardice herself. Against Cardice magic is more important than attack damage, so when
she appears you'll want to equip bracelets and a necklace that increase your MP, INT, and/or
MAG.
- In your inventory you should have all of your Health potions, every MP-restoring item you
have, any invincibility potions you might have left, and your spare bracelets and necklace.
THE FINAL BATTLE'S 3 MAIN PHASES:
- 1st - Journey to the Center of the Marmo:
For the first part of the battle you'll be trapped on an organic winged elevator. When
you first get on walk over to the flashing spot to start your descent. You'll be greeted
by several waves of basic demons. They're fast, but with a SPD of S, a high DMG/CRIT, and
some power in your Demon Buster Ancient they're all pretty easy. After a while the screen
will pan out so you can see that big multi-headed demon from the intro frozen in the ice in
the background. Not much longer after that and there will be a ring of explosions that kill
off any remaining demons.
Soon after, on the left side of the screen, a group of demons, a medusa, a mithril golem,
and one of the those big-winged bug-looking demons will appear. Kill off the medusa and the
other demons, but leave the Golem alive. As long as the golem stays alive you won't have to
fight any more monsters for the remainder of the ride. Just keep your distance and stay
opposite the golem from the center of the elevator and you should be able to get the lumbering
beast stuck on that crystal in the center. Watch golem display a flaw in the path-finding AI of
this game for a while untill you reach your destination, at which time it will spontaneously
combust. Exit the elevator, and save your game.
Note: if you use the teleport next to the save you won't be able to warp dirrectly back, and
will have redo the elevator ride.
- 2nd - Obtaining the Fire Rod:
You can go dirrectly after Cardice at this point (follow the grey brick road), but taking
the time to get the Fire Rod first will make the final boss considerably easier.
To get the Fire Rod you'll have to battle through 4 more sets of progessively harder enemies
just like the ones you fought on the elevator.
Each set is unlocked by destroying 1 of 4 exploding magic boulders.
1: The first boulder is located close to the save point, just right of the stone path, in the
center of a Stone Hedge type place. Wack the boulder a few times to destory it and prepare
to be surrouned.
NOTE: as soon as you destroy this first boulder both the save point and the portal back to
the Goblin Fort will disappear.
Once the enemies appear hurry up and run up and out of the stone circle to keep from getting
trapped. Kill the medusa and the smaller demons first, then use the pillars in the stone
circle to help you block the lighting blasts of the two giant bug-demons and kill them.
It's generally best to save the Golem for last, since it's slow and easy to dodge and you
don't want the other demons bothering you while you kill it. When they're all dead, pick up
the useless armor from where the exploding boulder was and head to the right.
2: The second bolder is on the right of area, next to a small hill, below Cardice' temple
(which is at the end of the stone walk way...don't go in there yet) Use your map and the
sound of the explosions to find it. If you don't have your Demon Buster powered up yet, then
it's a good idea to have Wall or Cage ready to help defend against the Medusa. Do the same
thing here, whack the stone, kill the enemies, collect the crappy armor, and seak out the
next stone. Don't equip the armor, just leave it in your inventory.
3: The third boulder is on a hill just south of the 2nd boulder. This one could be a problem
since there's only one path to the top of the hill and the enemies will block you off when
they appear. There are two ways you can do this:
- First: Whack the boulder a few times, but not a enough to destroy it, then go back down and
over to the left side of hill. Use Vortex (3rd level Wind spell) to do the remaining damage
to the boulder, so when the enemies appear you won't be trapped on top of the hill.
- Second: Have a Cage spell ready to go. Stand as far to the right of the boulder as your
range will allow and whack away. As soon as the boulder is destroyed immediately turn around
and quickly kill the medusa before it has time to turn you to stone. Toss up a cage to block
the lightning from the giant bug demons, and take out all the little demons. Try to get the
bug-demons stuck on the ramp to the top of the hill so you can take on just one at a time.
Fight your way off the hill, kill the remaining demons, then take out the golem. Grab the
armor and head to the upper-left.
4: The forth boulder requires allowing yourself to be trapped by the largest group yet.
It's in the top left, on a rock out-cropping in the middle of gorge, completely out of range
of any of your weapons. Vortex is the only means you have of damaging this boulder, so I hope
your MAG is high otherwise you're going to here a while. Use Vortex until the stone goes
down. You may have to use an MP-refiller (you still need some for Cardice so don't waste
them) or stand around and let your MP refill naturally if you get low. As soon as it's
destroyed, very quickly turn on the Wall or Cage spell and toss one up to the right to
protect yourself from 2 medusas in the bunch of badies. Kill the medusas and basic demons
first, then the bug-demons and golem, just like before.
Now, pick up your final prize for these 4 fights: the Fire Rod.
- 3rd - Cardice:
-Now that you have the Fire Rod in one of your item slots, time to equip the MP, MAG and/or
INT increasing bracelets and neclace that you stored in your inventory. It's a good idea
to have an MP-refiller item in one of the item slots as well.
-The Fire Rod is used like an Item, but consumes MP with every shot and the damage it does
is determined by your MAG power. It's an item that shoots rapid-fire long-range fire balls,
which means you can keep your distance while fighting cardice.
-Head on over Cardice' temple near the top right of the area, step on the shiny bit and begin.
Once the battle starts you'll have the entire wasteland area to run around and fight, so you
have plenty of room to dodge. If you get too far away, don't worry about it since Cardice
will follow you.
-You could fight her with just your basic sword, but I wouldn't suggest it. If you're close
enough to use your sword, then you're too close to dodge any of her attacks. She teleports
around a lot, and her teleport spell damages you if you're close to it, so it's in your best
interests to just keep your distance and use the Fire Rod. Keep an eye on your HP and MP,
stand back, dodge, and blast away with the Fire Rod.
-When she shoots her fire balls, just run around and dodge inbetween them. You can also
try and stand your ground and keep blasting with your Fire Rod and hope you can hit the
button faster than what she can shoot.
-She'll occasionally summon a couple of demons to help her out. Quickly dispatch them with
your sword and get back to fire-balling the queen b*tch.
-Half way through she'll summon that huge multi-head demon you saw frozen in the ice earlier.
You can't hurt it, but don't let it scare you. Just keep your distance and avoid the
petrifing lasers it shoots. If it gets too close then run the hell away (you have plenty
of room) and let Cardice teleport over to your new location. Just keep up with the Fire Rod,
heal and restore MP when needed and she'll go down soon enough.
After you kill Cardice it's time for the ending movie, credits, and another ending movie.
..and thus ends the best adventure/RPG yet released for DreamCast.
CopyRight:
Gau Boy is really neat
Gau Boy likes to beat meat
We all love you Gau Boy
Gau Boy is really neat
He likes to eat turtle meat
We all love you
Gau Boy
