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Efficiency Guide


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Star Ocean: The Last Hope

Efficiency Guide

 

MASSIVE SPOILER WARNING

 

This guide has what I believe to be the best course to take through the game in order to complete it in the least amount of time possible, while still maintaining your sanity. And believe it or not: a good time for this game is less than 400 hours. Hopefully you should be closer to 360, but anything under 400 is actually pretty good.

 

That being said, I don't know everything and would love input to make this better!

 

Part I: Stuff to Know

 

Before you begin, realize just what the heck you're going into. This game takes a while, no doubt. So the best way to reduce that time is by knowing everything about it before you even begin. You essentially want to go in with a plan.

 

Encyclopedia <---credit to The Pants Party

Battle Trophy Guide <---credit to vexacion

More Battle Trophy Stuff <---credit to ...everyone who posted

 

The encyclopedia is a great place to start. Print out or throw into Excel the following guides:

Item Creation

Private Actions

Spaceship Data

Treasure Chests

Quests

 

Why print out you say? These 5 guides are checklists. You MUST check off everything you do in relation to these achievements or else you will be completely lost at what you have or haven't done.

 

Spaceship data is the least important of these but it is nice to get them in order the first time. Rearrange the ships and place them in the following order, which is the order you'll find them in:

1, 4, 2, 6, 7, 8, 12, 15, 16, 20, 21, 17, 18, 19, 22, 3, 5, 9, 10, 13, 14, 11

 

You will not be able to get all treasure chests right away. Just be sure to not check them off. Item Creation and Quests should mostly be done post-game, but as expected, some are missable and are pointed out below.

 

Monsters are not necessary to print out as most are logged by simply playing through the game, although it is a good way to keep track of Faize's 130 unique enemy kills. Weapons go with chests and item creation and are tracked in game as well. You'll get most without too much trouble, but missables/annoying ones will be noted.

 

Skim through vexacion's battle trophy guide at least once. Although most is best done in the post game, many are easier at certain points in the story. I'll do my best to note those as well.

 

Once you feel ready, it's time to jump in!

 

Part II: Playthrough 0.2 (just beating the game)

 

NOTE: I'm not going to tell you where to walk and how to beat ___ boss or anything. I'm basically covering the essentials.

 

Goals:

-All endings

-All missables

-All chests possible

-Correct save backups

-40 hours

 

-As a general rule of thumb, it's not wise to give away your last item to complete a quest. Everything in the early game is common, though, so all missable quests can be completed without worry.

-NEVER DROP AN ITEM UNLESS YOU NEED TO OPEN A CHEST.

-BEAT: B is better than BEAT: S. Switch Edge, Bacchus, Meracle, and Arumat to it right away when you get them.

-NEVER EVER EVER SELL ANYTHING. ESPECIALLY IF YOU ONLY HAVE ONE OF IT. (Most notably the SRF Protector, obtained at the start of the game and only needed MUCH later)

-When I say "Main Faize", I mean get kill shots on new enemies with him. Otherwise work on kills with Edge.

-Never use any seeds except in synthesis.

 

Aeos

-IMMEDIATELY OBTAIN RECIPE MEMO 05. You get it from one of the guys walking around in the ship. This is your only chance. Once you defeat the first boss, it's gone for good.

-Getting treasure chests at this point is actually quite difficult. Just be sure to get the ones in the exploration base. The rest can wait until you have Lymle.

-The boss battle is a great chance to get Reimi's 85 long-range hits in a row. Shoot 3, take a few steps back and repeat.

-As soon as you get Faize, you will play him. Try to get the kill shot on the first boss. Then, go back and kill the other 6 enemy types available on Aeos. This works toward the 130.

-After beating the boss, accept all orders at both shops and do all 3 quests. You cannot complete every order yet.

-Also, buy an Eldarian Bow. I bought 2.

 

-Do all PAs on the flight to Lemuris. PAs are really not that hard to miss if you're paying attention, so I'm not really going to mention them going forward. You should get all 9 achievements easily.

 

Lemuris

-Continue to main Faize, getting the kill shots on every enemy type.

-Open the treasure chest inside the house first.

-Then, accept all orders in Triom. These are important.

-Progress to Alainair Citadel and find the Treasure Sense chest. Immediately teach this skill to Lymle. Your treasure hunt just became much easier.

-Accept all orders in Woodley, but don't actually worry about them.

-Now, complete the orders in Triom before going to the Celestial Ship. You will be forced to use item creation here, so be sure to mark off the 4 things you had to make. Once you complete the Celestial Ship, these are lost.

-Before completing the Celestial Ship, get 5 lizardskin (I'd get more). Also be sure to fight every enemy at the Celestial Ship.

-The spaceship data isn't missable, but you may as well grab it while you're there.

-Try and get the kill shot on the boss with Faize once again. It's difficult because you can't see its HP, but you can always reload and try again. If you got Armaros, you're at 2/55 Grigori!

 

Cardianon Mothership

-Open every single treasure chest. If you have too many of an item, drop by hitting "back." Check them off.

-Try to buy something from the vending machines after getting Bacchus to trigger that PA.

-Continue to get kill shots with Faize, including the boss. 3/55 Girgori!

-Fight every monster, which really isn't too difficult.

-Do not miss the spaceship data. It's about halfway through.

 

DO NOT GO TO "EN II" YET

 

-Go back to Aeos and complete the orders/quests. You can go back to Lemuris and get materials you may need (except lizardskin, but you got that).

-Open every chest inside the Exploration Base and get all spaceship datas if you didn't do these already.

 

Alternate Earth

-Main Faize. Get the kill shot on the mini-boss. You can scan its HP so it shouldn't be too much trouble.

-Open every chest here as well, in order. This includes the Earth Ring. You'll be needing that later.

 

Roak

-Faize is still your friend. He can't kill Black Eagle though so don't worry about it.

-Progress until you meet Lady Eleyna. When she collapses, be sure to examine her to get a weapon data.

-You should get the 50% chests achievement halfway through the Purgatorium if you've been following the guide correctly.

-You CAN scan Tamiel's HP, and he does count as a Grigori. 4/55!

-Go back to Aeos then come right back to Roak and complete the Astral Caves sidequest. Be certain to get the Cherished Bangle quest while doing so. It can only be obtained during your first runthrough of the Astral Caves.

-Every other quest on Roak can be completed at any time.

-I do recommend completing Desert Dilemma and The Sand Bird Strikes Back. Doing so removes the annoying quicksand.

 

Aeos

-Before doing anything, go back to the ship and go to item creation. Ensure Edge's Smithery skill is at least 8 and create the 4 recipes that you need Faize for.

-Once you get to the save point and recovery orb, STOP. Save in whatever slot you've been playing in normally. Then save in two other slots (e.g. 10 and 17). You will be returning to these saves in a solid 225 hours to work on Faize and Edge's battle trophies. My time at this point was just under 24 hours, so that's a good goal.

-Unequip all of Faize's gear and go forward into the Phantom Forces battle.

-Play as anyone but Edge for the first wave. After the first ambush thing shows up, switch to Edge. Do not switch control from here on out. You will get ambushed 6 times from there, earning you that battle trophy. Don't worry about 3, 4, and 5 yet.

-Say goodbye to Faize and welcome Arumat. You will now main Arumat as much as possible to progress to 30,000 kills.

-DO NOT TEACH ARUMAT AUTO HEAL YET. (I'm not even sure you can get it)

-Immediately following the Phantom Forces battle, go back to the ship and fight Arumat for that PA. You cannot do this after beating the boss in the Miga Insect Warren.

Edited by dertswa687o
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EN II

-When fighting Kokabiel, be sure to kill 100 of her spawns with Bacchus. Termination is better than Black Hole Sphere in this case. If you miss this you can still get it later in the Wandering Dungeon.

-Get the Funeral Bouquet recipe from the girl in the front of Centropolis.

-Under no circumstances leave EN II yet.

-Go back to the Sanctuary and complete the quest "Trial of Might." It's the white orb and it's only a quick mini-boss. You get a Laser Weapon as a reward. UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES SYNTHESIZE ANYTHING TO IT. Have I made myself clear?

On ENII to get the roses, your guide could use some improvement. You can actually get 2 blue roses per trip to the sanctuary if you discover the hidden harvesting point (in the inner area southwest of the gems, next to a broken piece of pillar or something). What I did was go to the sanctuary, save at the western save point, and then hit up the westernmost two harvesting points. Those are the only 2 out of the 4 that you can actually get blue roses. If you get one, run back to the west save point and save, then go to the other point and try and get another. Reload if you don't get a blue rose for each of these spots (upon reload, the stuff you harvest is re-randomized, so you can reload your save at the point in the sanctuary instead of having to go back to the ship like you say). Thus, you only need to go to the sanctuary 7 times total for blue roses including the first time you go when you fight the boss.

-After you have your 14 blue roses, you can safely progress to Nox Obscurus.

 

Nox Obscurus

-Once you have crash landed, you can use the handy teleporter to go back to Roak and get Denbrodium for the Bouquets. This is annoying becuase of disk swapping but it ensures you'll get the endings.

-Go around the universe and complete all the PAs that require a funeral bouquet.

-Then, you can safely beat the game. Enjoy the 55-minute ending. You'll have to go through it 5 times in total.

 

Part III: Playthrough 0.4 (beating Gabriel Celeste)

 

Nox

-Return to your save at the bottom the Audience Chamber.

-Go up the stairs and use the LEFT door to fight the Undying Dragon. Beating him earns you the darkness ring, which you can use to access the Cave of the Seven Stars (abbreviated as 7SD from here on).

-Go the door opposite the one you went in (on the right of the stairs) and use the one-way teleporter to return to your ship (which is sadly stuck on disk 3 forever).

-Go to Aeos.

 

Aeos

-You may have noticed on your handy treasure chest guide that Arumat's Dragon Roar skill lies in the Miga Insect Warren. So, go get it and teach it to him right away. That skill alone is going to be the only thing that will allow you to beat the bees and bats in the 7SD.

-Go to Tatroi.

 

7SD

-Go into the colosseum and use the save point at the entrance to the left.

-Then go a little farther in, past the sign-up place and turn left. Go past the stairs leading down and you'll eventually end up at a door that you need the darkness ring to remove. Use it and enter. Welcome to the 7SD!!!

-Use Dragon Roar to decimate most of the enemies in the dungeon. The bees and bats will give you a little trouble no matter what, but you'll be overleveled soon enough to take them on.

-On the 7th floor, get Duplication from a chest. Teach this to Arumat immediately and max it out. This is the most handy skill in the entire game and will make the item creation and quest achievements loads easier.

-After obtaining all the stars and gaining access to fight Gabe, stop and realize that you're way too underleveled.

-Go back to your ship and synth some EXP+++ materials. Use Curry Rice combined with the factor overflow trick (there's loads of guides out there for this). Three +15% EXP factors on a wrist accessory and neck accessory can be made quickly and then each duped 3 times for +360%. Putting factors on weapons helps too (recommend you buy cheap no-factor ones at En II). From there, go to the 6th floor of the 7SD and fight Metal Scumbags. Equip Bacchus with a Scumbag Slayer and use Black Hole Sphere to kill them quickly. There's only a real reason to level up your primary 4 (+Bacchus), so do just that. I recommend Arumat, Meracle, Reimi, and Sarah.

-Before fighting Gabe, grab the Water Ring in his room. You now have the ability to open every chest in the game, so run around and get that done. Sadly this means a quick trek through most dungeons, including the Palace of Creation....

-Once everyone is level 200, go fight Gabe. Spam Dragon Roar with Arumat and keep Sarah out of the way to heal. She should not have any other skills equipped or turned on.

-Do not worry about Meracle's 10-minute-kill trophy just yet. You can get it on any of Gabe's forms.

-Once you beat him, rejoice! But realize there is a far greater power that lies ahead and the road is not nearly over yet.

 

Part IV: Playthrough 0.6 (beating the Ethereal Queen)

 

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All right, before I begin this section, I'm going to give my thoughts on battle trophies, since you're about to tackle them finally.

 

There is one legitimately difficult battle trophy:

 

Lymle-100: Defeat the Ethereal Queen within 10 minutes

 

There are 6 legitimately long (>5 hours) battle trophies:

 

Edge-093: Defeat 30,000 enemies

Faize-093: Fight 3,000 battles

Faize-100: Defeat 55 Grigori

Bacchus-096: Obtain 255 Robotics item drops

Meracle-093: Obtain 255 Ornithology item drops

Arumat-098: Defeat 30,000 enemies

 

There are 893 very easy battle trophies.

 

With that said, you CAN 1k this game. If you can get Lymle-100, you can get every single other trophy with some time investment. Furthermore, if you understand the following sentence you will certainly finish this game within a reasonable time frame:

 

COMBINE BATTLE TROPHIES WHENEVER POSSIBLE.

 

The best place to take advantage of this idea is the colosseum. You have 200 battles, 200 enemies that you can do whatever you wish to.

 

For example, say I fight the first insect enemy in the colosseum with Faize and kill it with Terra Hammer for the first 100 times and then Reaping Spark the rest. During the 200 battles I have successfully worked on/finished colosseum wins, kills with Terra Hammer, kills with Reaping Spark, insect kills, 50 consecutive kills of the same type (at least initially), symbol-only kills, and battles. That is a pretty good use of those otherwise pointless battles.

 

The other two trophy types that are easily combined are item drops and specific enemy type kills. There are many others, you just need to be creative.

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-So now that you've beaten Gabe, it's time to tackle the Ethereal Queen, who is no joke by any stretch of the imagination. Furthermore, you need to beat her within 10 minutes, getting the kill shot with Lymle, who can only damage her with Hound Grenade. That means some preparation is necessary.

-Start by breaking the level cap (50% BT) on every character (except Faize) before even entering the Wandering Dungeon.

-You're going to want to pick the easiest battle trophies for every character. For example, Bacchus's 80 consecutive long-range hits, deal at least 99,999 points of damage for every character (Self Destructor 3000 (SD3K) + Sacred Pain on bugs on Aeos), and Sarah's 5,555 jumps are very easy and don't take very long (though I'd recommend a wired controller for Sarah in that instance). If you're running out of ideas, go ahead and go to the colosseum for every character but Edge.

-Your goal this playthrough is to get as few kills as possible with Edge, yet still get somewhere in the 70% range of battle trophies. You will NOT be doing Edge's 30,000 kills on this playthrough, so any kill you get with Edge serves no purpose whatsoever. This means avoid the colosseum, poisoned enemies, drops, etc. Doing them later will actually count for something and you won't waste any time. I managed to get 77% of Edge without getting 700 enemies killed, so it is entirely possible.

-Avoid anything like enemy type kills, item drops, exact damage, etc.

-Once you have that done (remember, easy trophies), take the EXP equipment you made a while ago and level everyone up to level 255. You don't need Meracle, Bacchus, or Myuria for the EQ, but it's nice to have them as backup just in case.

-Next you need 80,000,000 Fol. First, synth a bunch of Fol+++ equipment similarly to how you did the EXP equipment. Use Mille-Feuille (obtained from the Where's the Recipe? quest) to get the highest increase. Give Bacchus no weapon and the No Guard ability and go back to the Metal Scumbags on the 6th floor of the 7SD. Turn everyone on manual (to do this quickly, switch to them in battle and hit left or right on the d-pad) and spam Black Hole Sphere with Bacchus. The scumbags will steal Fol from you when they're in rush mode. After a little while, switch to a Scumbag Slayer and kill them. The Fol you earn counts the Fol the scumbags stole, so your synthed factors will help loads. 80 million Fol will come in no time.

Edited by dertswa687o
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-I haven't really said anything about quests. You should be in a good enough position to complete nearly every single one before fighting the Ethereal Queen. Sadly this requires some item grinding at points, and a lot of Magical Clay, but it is much easier to do the quests in the post-game rather than the main game.

-You should STILL hold off on item creation but you probably will get the 20% achievement during your quest-completing adventure.

 

Before entering the Wandering Dungeon for the first time, be sure you have the following:

-Everyone at level 255

-Dragon Roar

-Santa's orders (you probably just need the food)

-Fully-charged disintegration rings

-Lymle's charge skill maxed

-20 Disintegration Stones and Magical Clay

-All -ology skills maxed

-80,000,000 Fol (at least)

-3 hours of time

 

The Wandering Dungeon is composed of random floors, so there is no map. Every odd floor (1, 3, 5, etc.) has one of the following objectives:

-"Defeat our assassins." A simple 3-6 ambush battle. The best one to get.

-"Bring to us x Geostones." You have to collect Geostones from enemies as a drop, or find them in chests. The worst one to get.

-"Destroy the abhorrent crystals." Crystals are located in every room on the floor (except the one you start out in and the one where the objective is), each color requiring a different ring to destroy. This is where the Charge skill comes in handy, as the Light Ring has a solid 1 use and the Darkness Ring comes with a whole 3. Good on the early floors, but terrible on the later floors.

 

Every even floor (2, 4, 6, etc.) has a boss. They all drop Saraphic Dolls, which is all the red spire thing will ask for. The bosses are as follows:

2F: Prehistoric Psynard

4F: Ring Beast

6F: Chimera Beast

8F: Imperfect Armaros

10F: Armaros Manifest II

12F: Runaway Dragon

14F: Kokabiel Risen

16F: Shadow Edge, Bacchus, and Myuria

18F: Shadow Faize, Lymle, and Meracle

20F: Ethereal Queen

 

The hardest boss other than the Ethereal Queen is Armaros Manifest II by far.

 

WD Run #1

-Restart if you get Geostones on the first floor. It's not worth the grind when you can just leave and eventually get one of the other 2.

-Open every chest no matter what. You need to get the following weapons for Arms Addict, only located on certain floors:

-Artifact Bow (4F, 6F)

-Blazing Wand (7F, 8F)

-Infinity Saber (7F, 11F)

-Trident Harpoon (9F, 13F)

-Hidden Claws "Crimson Falcons" (10F, 12F)

-Blood Scepter (14F, 15F)

-Ultimate Cannon (16F, 18F)

-Demon Sword "Levantine" (17F, 19F)

-Lil Vending Machine 3 (9F)

-Lil Vending Machine 3 has all the items necessary to create symbol cards, saving you loads of time later.

-You will not get all of these in one run. There is only a chance they will show up on these floors, there is no guarantee. However, they will ONLY show up on the respective floors and not any others.

-Santa starts to show up on floor 9 and up. He only shows up in dead end rooms similar to those where bosses are. He can show up more than once even (I had him on 14 and 15 once) but it is very unlikely.

-If you get to him BEFORE fighting Armaros Manifest II, duck out immediately afterward. Either way, when you do reach him, complete all his orders FIRST, buy all the weapons and armors he sells, 20 tri-Emblems, all his skills, items, etc.

-If you had to beat Armaros Manifest II, you have no reason to stop yet. Go to floor 13+ and try to find a room with 2 or 3 Damascus Fort enemies. Fight them until you get a Philosopher's Stone drop (pretty rare). Stick Myuria in for the possibility that the -ology skill matters. You also need a Dragon God Scale, obtained from Dominator Dragons on floor 16+. You can steal them with Myuria or Meracle and escape, similarily to how you steal Magical Clay. Obviously they also drop them.

-If you get far enough, kill the shadows with the respective characters for those battle trophies. Yes, Faize is on Floor 18 and it's a huge pain later on.

-Definitely leave after reaching Floor 20 if for some reason you decide to go that far.

 

Synthesis Land

-The Calnus is still stuck on Disk 3 on Nox, which is the biggest pain of all. Therefore, Welch is stuck on Disk 3 and so is item creation. Boo tri-Ace.

-It's time to make some stuff to prepare for the Ethereal Queen! I recommend saving in a different slot before doing this.

 

Wrist: Take a tri-Emblum and synth 8 tri-Emblems to it. It should have the following factors:

 

HIT +2

Rush Gauge charge rate +3

Grants immunity to paralysis

MP cost -15% in battle

 

Duplicate this 4 times (so you have 5) at the cost of 1 Magical Clay each.

 

Neck: Take an Anti-Silence Amulet and synth an Anti-Void amulet to it. Then synth that to an Anti-Stun Amulet and finally synth 2 tri-Emblems. Factors:

 

Grants immunity to stun status

Grants immunity to silence

Grants immunity to void status

Rush Gauge charge rate +3

 

Duplicate this 4 times (so you have 5) at the cost of 1 Magical Clay each.

 

Armor: Create a Laser Suit in item creation. Take a different blank (no factors) armor (Alchemist's Cloak recommended) and give it the following factors:

 

Nullify HP damage 25% of the time (Blue Talisman)

DEF +20% (Potent Defense Seeds)

DEF +20%

Maximum HP +20% (Potent Health Seeds)

 

Synth that armor to the Laser Suit and it will get those factors. Then, synth your remaining 10 tri-Emblems to it but DO NOT DUPLICATE IT YET.

 

WD Run #2

-Now that you have your Super tri-Emblum and your awesome Anti-Stun Amulet, nothing in the first 19 floors should scare you.

-Open chests for any floors you do not yet have the weapon on. As you start to get more of them, WD runs go a lot faster.

-If you never got a Philosopher's Stone during your first run, be sure to get one now, as well as a Dragon God Scale.

-When you find Santa again, buy 20 tri-Emblems again and anything else you need.

 

Synthesis Land v2

-Start by synthing 5 more tri-Emblems to your Laser Armor from earlier.

 

Weapon: Take your untouched Laser Weapon and dupe it once for 11 Magical Clay. Next, take a blank weapon (Observer's Sword recommended) and give it the following factors:

 

Increases critical hit chance (Crystal)

ATK/INT/DEF/HIT/GRD +5% (Hyper Potion)

ATK/INT/DEF/HIT/GRD +5%

ATK/INT/DEF/HIT/GRD +5%

 

Synth that weapon to one of the Laser Weapons to pass along those factors. Then, take your final 15 tri-Emblems and synth them to that Laser Weapon.

 

Finally dupe the Laser Armor and Laser Weapon 4 times each (so you have 5 of each) at the cost of 11 Magical Clay each, or 88 Magical Clay. It's worth the effort in the end.

 

WD Run #3

-Before departing, make at least 1 Otherworldly Cuisine for Sarah for the Ethereal Queen, have 20 Fainting Potions, and a good few Resurrection UNITS. This is the most important thing to do and otherwise you will probably not get the trophy.

-Yeah, this is the hard one. Be sure to have 4+ hours of time to do this, as trekking to floor 20 takes some serious time and willpower.

-As usual, open up chests on floors you need to. You'll probably encounter Santa along the way so you may as well buy as many tri-Emblems as you can afford. There's no reason to go all out and grind Fol again though.

-When you make it to floor 20, take a deep breath and relax. The fight will be over within 10 minutes. But yes, read what I have to say about her first.

 

The Ethereal Queen

-First, watch a video of her if you haven't already. That should help you learn a little bit about her behavior.

-Your team is Edge, Reimi, Arumat, and Sarah, all with the gear you made earlier equipped. Lymle should be in reserve with the same stuff. Your skill setup is the following:

 

Edge @ Raging Strike x3, Critical Hit, HP Boost

Reimi @ Crimson Squall x6, Critical Hit

Arumat @ Dragon Roar x3, Critical Hit, Pride (why not?)

Sarah @ Nothing, HP Boost, Fury Boost

Lymle @ Hound Grenade x4, HP Boost, Fury Boost

 

-Obviously all skills are maxed. You should have more than enough SP for that.

-Everyone should be on BEAT: B as well.

-Before the battle, use an Otherworldly Cuisine on Sarah.

-Make sure all her healing spells and Resurrection are turned on and NOTHING else.

 

-As far as I know, menu time does not count, but I am NOT SURE about that.

-Start by taunting with Edge or Arumat to lure her into a corner away from Sarah. Then move Sarah into the opposite corner and park her there for the rest of the battle. Sarah's AI is great. She won't move or even attempt to attack, and the Ethereal Queen will not try to attack her since you used an Otherworldly Cuisine.

-Play as Arumat and spam Dragon Roar. Edge and Reimi should be doing their jobs just fine, just be sure to keep the EQ away from Sarah. The beginning of the fight will feel very easy.

-Rush combos take up more time than they're worth so I do not recommend using them.

-Keep an eye on the EQ's Rush Gauge. As you deal more and more damage, it'll start to decrease at a slower and slower rate while she's in Rush Mode. This is the key to knowing her health.

-Eventually, she'll start annihilating you with Supernova (if you hear "cease to be," you're basically dead). There's simply no defense against this except distance, which you don't have time to get. If she kills Arumat, Edge, and Reimi, switch to Sarah and use a Resurrection Unit to revive the whole team, then immediately cast Faerie Star. Hopefully you'll manage to get it off before she annihilates your team again.

Edited by dertswa687o
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-Once her Rush Gauge starts INCREASING WHILE SHE'S IN RUSH MODE, you need to do a couple things. Put Edge and Reimi on Manual. Use Dragon Roar twice MAX with Arumat. Then, take Arumat, taunt the EQ into a corner, and use a fainting potion on him and turn him to manual (while in the menu). Get Edge over there ASAP and do the same thing.

-Switch Reimi out for Lymle.

-Spam Hound Grenade like no tomorrow. You won't be doing very much damage (20k-30k), but every little bit counts. The EQ will normally not use Supernova with the fainting potions active, but you are in range so look out and be ready to switch to Sarah in case.

-IF the fainting potions run out before you get the kill (it happened to me), use them again and continue to spam Hound Grenade.

 

If You Got the Battle Trophy

-Great job!!!!!!!

-Find the nearest exit and get the heck out of the WD. You can either go back to the room you started at on this floor OR advance to the next one and use that room to exit.

-Save in a different slot JUST IN CASE. Odds are you won't need to fight the EQ in 2-wing form ever again, but it's nice to have the save available.

 

If You Didn't Get the Battle Trophy

-Well, I'm sorry. It pretty much sucks, but you're going to have to do this again later.

-Find the nearest exit and get the heck out of the WD. You can either go back to the room you started at on this floor OR advance to the next one and use that room to exit.

-SAVE IN A DIFFERENT SLOT FOR CERTAIN. You WILL return to this save at some point to try again (I hope). Don't let one failure put you off from completing this game. This is the hardest battle trophy for a reason.

 

-Either way, there's still a ton of other stuff to do. Most of it can be tackled in whatever order you desire, but battle trophies should be done last (but before Universe and Chaos).

 

Part V: Playthrough 0.8 (lots of random stuff)

 

You need to tackle the following things before going on your battle trophy hunt (some you may have already done which is fine):

-Colosseum

-Quests

-Bunny Racing

-4 MORE EQ KILLS

-4 MORE GABE KILLS

-Item Creation

-Arms Addict

 

The Colosseum

-I highly recommend getting Rank 1 in both ladders, Team and Solo. You must get team in order to fight Ashley, who Edge needs to beat in under 5 minutes (which is really easy). I recommend ascending Solo with Arumat so you can get the Solo Champion Medal, which is useful for adjusting your attack for exact damage battle trophies.

-All in all, you'll get 3 achievements by getting to rank 1 in either team or solo.

-Aside from that, there's the colosseum battle trophies. They are very tedious which is why I recommend doing them over time rather than continuously. But I wouldn't bother with them right now.

 

Quests

-Honestly, you shouldn't be missing much at this point if you didn't complete them all earlier. If you do have some left they shouldn't take too long to complete. Just a lot of messing around in Item Creation... oh and Duplication. That comes in handy too. I duped a lot of Intensified Gunpowder :p

 

Bunny Racing

-If you look at my achievement dates you'll notice a 3-month gap between the first bunny race achievement and the second. They're THAT boring. I was more willing to grind out Arumat's 30,000 kills than subject myself to the torture that is bunny racing.

-Anyway, max out your bunny in all stats by feeding it lots of pies. 3 of them you can buy all the ingredients to and 1 of them you cannot. Thankfully the Miracle Pie adds 3 to a random stat so you can just make those when the other 2 are maxed out.

-Class 100 races are really easy to win. Hit A and your bunny will dash. His face on the left will turn more mean looking. Immediately when that ends, press A again. Repeat. Repeat. If one of your opponents is flashing, hit B to jump and avoid getting stunned by the other jump. Then start doing the A repitition thing again. If your bunny runs into another one it gets slowed down so mash A to get past it.

-If all that was confusing... there's other guides out there that probably explain it better. You'll pick up on it quickly.

 

4 MORE EQ KILLS

-This is the best part!

-In one run, you will kill the Ethereal Queen four more times!

-Before departing, stock up on the same things as before. Otherworldly Cuisine, Resurrection Units, Magical Clay, Arumat, Time, etc.

-If you still haven't gotten all the necessary weapons for Arms Addict (highly likely), open chests on the correct floors as usual. Otherwise blaze through the floors.

-When you reach the EQ again, set everyone to the same things as before, EXCEPT SET REIMI TO 3X SAVAGE SPARROWS.

-Don't forget to use an Otherworldly Cuisine on Sarah before each EQ battle.

-The actual fight is quite simple. Arrange everything like before, with Sarah in the opposite corner.

-Take care of any remaining taunts Arumat may need right at the beginning of the 4-wing battle (the first one).

-Use Savage Sparrows with Reimi. This will fill your Rush Gauge. Go into a Rush Combo, hopefully with Arumat. Repeat for a while.

-Reimi will probably be running low on MP after a while so use Sarah to restore it with a Mental Stimulant.

-Eventually the EQ will fall. Yay!

-Go to floor 21, which is the exact same as floor 19. So if you got assassins there, this process is a lot quicker.

-Floor 22 is the same as 20 including where the EQ is. The exact same tactic will beat her even with 6 wings.

-After killing 6-wing EQ three times, leave with your 5 feathers and save at the EN II inn as fast as you can. A power outage while running there would suck...

-And (this is the best part folks) YOU NEVER HAVE TO SEE THE ETHEREAL QUEEN EVER AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!

 

4 MORE GABE KILLS

-This is loads easier.

-However, there's a couple things that you should do during these 4 kills, mostly in relation to battle trophies.

-You should ensure you have the following trophies before killing Gabe the 5th time (all needed via the bosses in the 7SD):

 

-Meracle's Kill Gabriel Celeste within 10 minutes

-Meracle's Steal an accessory (one of the rangers gives a tri-Emblum when stolen from)

-Any "land a hit on an opponent's weak point" trophies (Sahariel and Barachiel)

-Edge's Kill a Grigori with a rush combo (Tamiel)

-Lymle's Deal 99,999 damage with Fire Bolt (Barachiel)

 

-To actually kill Gabe 4 more times, take control of Meracle. Blindside, X-Claw 4 times, repeat. You should get the 10 minute kill trophy randomly one of the 4 times but honestly... it takes 5 minutes to get back to Gabe.

 

Item Creation

-It takes a while.

-You should have gotten a Philosopher's Stone during your Wandering Dungeon adventures. Dupe it so that you have 13 of them. 12 are needed and 1 is backup. Yes, that's a lot of magical clay.

-Most other items are just a pain. The ingredients aren't tough to get, it's just the extreme annoyance of switching disks constantly. So long as you have everything from the WD, you'll be ok.

-Duplicating an item is often faster than getting more of it, unless you can buy it.

-Some of the combos for inventing recipes are listed incorrectly in the guide. If you run into trouble, try searching google or something. Universal Armor comes to mind. The combination (Edge, Bacchus, Sarah) isn't needed to discover any other recipe and is listed incorrectly.

-Use Lil' Vending Machine 3 to get symbol cards faster as the ingredients can be bought from it without travelling to EN II.

 

Arms Addict

-This should be your last non-battle-trophy or universe/chaos achievement, assuming you didn't put off bunny racing like I did.

-If for some reason you were unsuccessful in obtaining all of the WD unique items, keep making trips until you get them. They're completely random. Yes, it sucks. And no, you can't speed it up (aside from getting lucky floors).

-Most other weapons are made through item creation or bought in shops, both of which you should have knocked out by now.

-Lastly, the Colosseum has some unique weapons. So long as you can afford the most expensive one, you can buy it and save in a different slot and still retain your tokens. It works just like the battle trophy saves. Then, reload your previous save and buy all the cheaper ones and the achievement should unlock. You can do the same thing and save in a different slot if you don't want those to go away, but otherwise you can reload to get your tokens back.

 

Part V: Playthrough 1.0 (BATTLE TROPHIES)

 

-As stated previously, you should combine battle trophies whenever possible. Most are very straightforward but very time consuming.

-Vexacion's guide does a great job of just about everything. Go there first.

 

(I don't necessarily recommend doing these in this order)

 

Exact Damage

-Everyone freaks out about these but they're probably some of the quickest and easiest.

-Now that you have all your stuff from item creation and a whole bunch of items, getting an exact atk/int is very easy. That's why it is best to save these.

-Most atk/int numbers can be found on the other battle trophy guide (from the forums here). Bacchus's are very convenient and will save you ages of time.

-You can also keep adjusting your attack higher or lower until it does the damage needed. Damage is a lot more touchy as you reach higher stats so it may take a little time.

-Easiest one not mentioned anywhere: Meracle's 777. Equip a 2xSS and ATK Boost to get 1000 atk. Fight Unicorn Wolves with normal attacks and the third hit should be very close.

 

-MAIN POINT HERE: FIND A NUMBER BEFORE MESSING WITH IT YOURSELF.

 

Exact Healing

-Sarah's three exact healing trophies are very easy so long as you don't use health seeds on Edge, Reimi, or Sarah the whole game. And since the boost is nearly worthless you didn't. Right? Good.

-Vexacion's guide outlines the exact synthesis done to get them. Don't even attempt to do it any other way.

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-I recommend saving in a different slot afterward so you don't lose the Silver Chalice. But it's pretty much worthless anyway so it doesn't matter too much.

 

Blindsides

-A pain, yes, but very easy.

-Make sure Edge, Meracle, and Arumat have their BEAT: S high enough to do double blindsides.

-Fight Metal Golems on EN II and double blindside them for about an hour each to get to 1000. Sadly, there's not really another battle trophy you can work on during this.

 

Drops and Enemy Types

-Why does this game take a while? Oh yeah, these.

 

Edge

-Don't even start.

 

Reimi

-Plants on early WD floors drop Geostones as their -ology drop. For quick kills chain Crescent Wings. For best results get surprised and have 3 plant mobs in the same room.

 

Lymle

-Around WD floor 7-8 you should start seeing undead enemies. Get 3 in one room and collect Geostones as your drop. Use black hole sphere and then trinity blaze.

-Scumbags are best done in the colosseum. Be sure to knock out the 99 Metal Scumbags in the 7SD before getting to 999, otherwise you wasted some time. The fight you should use is Space Cowboys, near the top. There is no drop for scumbags. Use the same method as above, just ensure Bacchus doesn't have a Scumbag Slayer and Lymle does.

 

Bacchus

-Fight the robots at Nox Obscurus in the Halls of Termination. There is a section with 2 close together, so it's easy to get them in an ambush. The drop you're looking for is MP Absorption Units. After you get 999 mechanical kills, use Arumat to get more kills similar to the method noted for Meracle below. These drops take 10-12 hours.

 

Meracle

-Combo time! Fight crater perytons on 7SD floor 2. You'll know the location when you see it. Get surprised (can be a pain) and ambushed. Use Meracle until you have 999 avians killed (spam drill spike or black hole sphere/x-claw for quick kills). Then, use Arumat to get kills. Right before killing the last one, switch to Meracle to get the drop. Literally use Dragon Roar toward the last ones and switch to Meracle while Arumat is using it. You'll knock out ~4000 of Arumat's kills this way and not lose too much time.

 

Sarah

-Fight kobold bandits on Roak and spam Tornado. You'll get credit for animal kills and airborne kills. They also drop all-purpose ceramic, which counts as an ology drop and is their only drop. I'm not sure if it matters but I ensured Tornado took 2 hits to kill so they were certainly airborne.

 

Myuria

-Myuria cannot kill anything quickly. Fight Jade Golems in the WD, floor 6-8. Do the exact same thing as with Meracle. Geostones are the drop and they come quickly. Later, go to the 7SD and use plasma cyclone on Leonblades to get 999 demons much more quickly. Killing Jade Golems with Myuria is more trouble than it's worth.

 

Arumat

-Don't specifically devote time to these trophies as you'll undoubtedly get them while going for his 30k kills.

 

Enrage/Fury/Resurrection/Incapacitation Trophies

-These trophies are fun if only because Lymle gets to die a crap ton of times. First, you need 1 HP armor. The Spriggan monster jewel halves your HP, then you can synth a couple more -HP% factors onto a Laser Armor. Be sure you don't have HP Boost set since then you'll have 10001 HP, which confused me at several points.

-Also, go ahead and synth 4 Green Talismans together for a solid chance to survive incap via fury.

-Fight the first enemy on Nox. There's a nice little crevice where you can put Lymle (with 1 HP armor but NO Green Talisman) and Edge (who has normal armor). Taunt the enemies to attack you there and set Edge and Lymle to manual. Now, there's about 3 things you can do here:

1. Control Lymle and die 100 times while Sarah resurrects you.

2. Control Myuria (with Rage Boost) and get enraged 40 times while Sarah (or you as Sarah) resurrects Lymle.

3. Control Reimi, Meracle, or Myuria in Lymle's position, wearing 1 HP armor and a Green Talisman. Meanwhile Sarah revives. Switch as trophies are obtained.

 

-For 999 resurrections, make 3 sets of 1 HP armor, use an Otherworldly Cuisine on Sarah, turn off all spells except Restoration, and head into an easy battle like Bugs, Bugs, Bugs in the colosseum. Leave Sarah on Auto and switch between characters so you land on Sarah once she casts Restoration. This avoids all the menuing as the battle trophy will still increment as long as you have control when the spell is cast.

 

-As a side note for those who are wondering, Edge is just there to attract enemy attention so they don't attack Sarah. You may need to adjust Lymle's position from time to time so she doesn't guard against the attacks.

-If you don't get the fury trophies, the SD3K method is very reliable and you'll surely get them. It just takes a little longer.

 

Arumat's "Win with 1-5 HP" Trophies

-You need Auto-Healing Rank 1 for these to be easiest, which is why you can finally teach it to him.

-Get an accessory that adds 100 HP.

-Get a bunch of poison ciders.

-Be sure everyone's on manual.

 

1 HP: DANGER! DO NOT DRINK! Finish battle. Done.

2 HP: DANGER! DO NOT DRINK! Equip +100 HP accessory. Auto-Heal for 1 time. Unequip +100 HP accessory. Drink poison cider for one tick. Heal poison. Finish battle. Done.

3-5 HP: Do the same thing, just let Auto-Heal and poison go off 1 more time for each increase in HP needed.

 

Hits

-You're just going to work on Meracle's 99,999 hits for now and save Edge's for later.

-Take a Slayer's Bangle, dupe it, and synth those together. Dupe THAT, then synth those together to get the almighty 4ATK Slayer's Bangle, which allows you to do 5 hits for 1 normal attack. Probably the most useful item ever in my opinion.

-Give Meracle a 2xSS and the 4ATK Slayer's Bangle and enter Bugs, Bugs, Bugs! in the colloseum for quick hits BUT do this dead last of all of Meracle's trophies. Otherwise, you're just wasting hits.

 

Arumat's 30k Enemies

-Now, if you did Meracle's and Myuria's drops correctly, you should be very close if not over 8,888 enemies.

 

OPTIONAL: I had some fun with this trophy since I made it unlock the 90% achievement. I had the following setup:

Edge: 77

Faize: 33

Arumat: 99

Reimi, Lymle, Bacchus, Meracle, Sarah, Myuria: 100

 

So that's exactly 809 trophies. Now, I'm not saying you have to do it this way, but it is nice to get an achievement for all the hard work.

 

From 8,000 to 30,000 takes around 35 hours with the following method. Equip Bacchus with a 2xSS and Arumat with an earth-based weapon that gives him max attack since the bees are weak to earth. Bacchus should have Black Hole Sphere x4 and Arumat should have Dragon Roar x2, Critical Hit, and No Guard.

 

Go to the 7SD and fight the first enemies you encounter on the first floor. Use Black Hole Sphere with Bacchus to group them together then use Dragon Roar to take them all out quickly. Sometimes you can get them all in 1 Dragon Roar but it often took me 2. Continuously get surprised and ambushed and you should average 12 enemies/2 encounters (Max 14, Min 10). WALK, don't run, a couple steps and use Ocarina to respawn. WHICH MEANS (believe it or not, this is a fairly good time saver) PUT MERACLE IN THE FIRST SLOT.

 

Now, this is REALLY boring. It does require some attention, moreso than Edge's 30k, but it's still REALLY boring. I watched Dragonball Z while doing this. Just find SOMETHING to watch/do or else you will lose your mind.

 

When you finally have Reimi, Lymle, Bacchus, Meracle, Sarah, Myuria, and Arumat all at 100, it's time to load one of those backup saves you made. A looooooooong time ago you were about to fight the Phantom Forces for the first time. Well, you made 2 backup saves there hopefully. So, it's time for...

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  • 2 weeks later...

Part VI: Playthrough 1.25 (Faize's shadow and other assorted things)

 

Now, there may be some debate on what's faster here. It may be slightly faster to start a new game on Earth difficulty and redo the enemy kills. But then you're sacrificing the 25+ hours of work you've already put in. But you also get a much easier time with Armaros Manifest II and the beginning of the 7SD. So, it's debatable. I went with my original save but if you're adamant about starting over go for it.

 

-ALL you need are Faize's and Edge's battle trophies!

 

-Start by switching Faize to BEAT: S right away, as well as putting him in your party for more enemy kills. "Main Faize" still has the same meaning as originally stated. The reason for the BEAT switch is Faize's trophy for blindsiding 6 enemies at once. Multiple blindsides can only be done when BEAT: S is level 17 or higher. It's possible that you won't even reach this level before finishing all his other trophies (minus battles). BEAT levels up based on the number of battles the character has fought, so you'll definitely get there eventually.

 

-Before going to the Palace of Creation, make some EXP+ gear. You don't need anything super complicated yet and definitely don't go out of your way for this. Just anything that gives you a small boost.

-No fancy funereal bouquets or complicated PAs need to be done. Just continue to focus on Faize's enemy kills throughout.

-You do NOT need to fight Satanail and sit through the ending again. The game simply checks for clear data in order to access the Darkness Dragon.

 

-Beat the Darkness Dragon (kill shot Faize, reload if you don't get it). But then go backward.

-Fight the big dog-looking enemies since they give you boatloads of EXP.

-Level up to the mid 90s. That should put you in a decent position to survive the initial onslaught that is 7SD Floor 1.

-In the 7SD, go for the Grigori kills with Faize (Barachiel, Tamiel, and Sahariel). Don't lose sleep if you miss them though.

-Level up for Gabe just like before. Good memories...

-Oh, and Faize can learn Duplication, so teach it to him and max it out. Thankfully tri-Ace wasn't too cruel to take that away when you choose to forego Arumat.

 

-Now, getting the kill shot on Gabe is extremely difficult. I, by some miracle, got it. Odds are extremely high that you won't. That's fine. Move on.

 

-For Faize's shadow you must trek to Floor 18 of the WD again. Which means you have to beat Armaros Manifest II.

-I did not have Faize over 50% battle trophies yet, so I did not have the level cap broken before entering the WD. Everything was fine.

-But you can level everyone else up to level 255 really easily. So make the same (-_-) EXP+++ equipment you did previously, as well as some Fol+++ stuff too. Thankfully you only need 40,000,000 Fol this time since we're only making one trip!

 

The Trek to Floor 18

-I'm likely blowing this trip way out of proportion, but it's essential you get this right the first time.

-You will COMPLETE Faize's 130th enemy somewhere in the later floors. Realize that the first 3 mini bosses are on the monster list and therefore COUNT as kills.

-Armaros Manifest II sucks, just like the first time. You can beat him, I believe in you.

-Buy 20 tri-Emblems from Santa, just like before.

-Finally kill Shadow Faize with Faize.

 

And that means we can move on to...

 

Part VII: Playthrough 1.5 (Ultimate Battler)

 

So essentially all you have left to do is Edge's 30k kills and Faize's 3k battles. I'm not going to lie, the rest of Faize's battle trophies are a complete joke. Like, I don't even think any sort of a guide is necessary but I'll give it a shot.

 

Synthesis Land v3

Well, you do have to beat Gabe a ton of times, and you'll be needing decent equipment to do so. So make the same Anti-Stun Amulet and Super tri-Emblum as before. There's 10 tri-Emblems gone. Finally, make the same Laser Armor and throw the last 10 on there. Yeah, you're not going to have the same crazy good stuff as before but you don't really need it.

 

Next, complete all of Faize's trophies minus battles. You'll probably have to save the blindside one for one of the last since BEAT: S has to level up. Once again, this is a complete joke. Even the Grigori. 5 hours max once you memorize their locations. Gabe goes down to constant X-Claw spam. It might take a little longer than your original 5 kills but the time to make better equipment isn't worth it.

 

Now complete any miscellaneous Edge trophies you have left. This includes every trophy except straight kills, humanoid kills, Anthropology drops, buttons, and hits.

 

Make a 4ATK Slayer's Bangle for Edge before departing to the Palace of Creation. Set up your party like so: Meracle, Edge, Faize, Sarah. Meracle in the first slot for quick access to Ocarina, Edge and Faize for obvious reasons, and Sarah for the heck of it.

 

Turn left after entering and look at the staircase. When looking up the stairs from the bottom, the left side at the bottom is the place you'll be grouping enemies. To do so, fight them one at a time at/near that location. Then go somewhere else and sprint towards it. Pause just before you enter the area and use Ocarina. That'll respawn the enemies and you'll run right into a 6 (or less) ambush battle. Mash A to win. When you get less than 6 battles, you have to regroup the enemies you lost.

 

Here's a video of how this is done. Once again, credit to vexacion:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRfsY9Qgc0M]Star Ocean 4: Edge 30,000 Enemies / 255 Anthropology Setup - YouTube[/ame]

 

Repeat this for a while. It took me 48 hours. Some people have more trouble and it takes longer. Either way, it's arguably more boring than Arumat's 30k since you only have to pay attention every couple minutes to restart the battle. I went back to watching Dragonball Z.

 

For comparison's sake:

Arumat's rate: 720 enemies/hour

Edge's rate: 600 enemies/hour

 

You will get every trophy EXCEPT 99,999 hits. But you will be close. Equip a 2xSS and 4ATK Slayer's Bangle and go back to the best Colisseum battle ever: Bugs, Bugs, Bugs. Spam A until... the... achievement... UNLOCKS!!!!!!

 

Congratulations!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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  • 3 weeks later...

Part VIII and Part IX: Playthroughs 2.5 and 3.5 (Universe and Chaos)

 

Universe and Chaos are very easy, especially with the experience you have in the game now. I beat Universe in 9 hours and Chaos in 8 hours. I beat Satanail on Chaos at level 52, and you will too. I'm just writing a guide for Chaos because you can do the exact same thing on Universe and be fine.

 

-Before beginning be sure to have the Ashley jewel available by getting 100% monster data on Ashley. You will have to beat him 7 times, which should take all of 10 minutes at level 255.

 

-Skip cutscenes, always.

 

-Start off like usual. Open the occasional chest you come across. Use blindsides to beat the bugs easily and try to build a blue bonus board for more experience. Save before fighting Armaros of course.

 

BOSS: ARMAROS. A lot of people consider the beginning of the game to be really hard and Armaros to be a tough first boss. He's a joke. Play as Reimi and do the same method mentioned at the beginning of the guide. Shoot 3 shots, move a little farther away, rinse and repeat. Armaros will pay no attention to Edge or Faize, who will rack up damage over time. Eventually the armor will break and you'll be able to do some actual damage. Use Fresh Sages that you may have if anyone dies.

 

-Ignore PAs and head back to the ship and go to Lemuris. You can buy a better weapon before departing if you want.

-Sleep the whole way because PAs are pointless (this goes for the whole game).

 

-You received a Monster Jewel before you left. Transfer Ashley's monster data onto it and give it to Edge. Edge is now essentially invincible and will deal a lot more damage.

-Get Lymle and keep going. The second Monster Jewel is located in one of the northern chests on the ice lake I believe. Give that one to anyone. The DEF boost is invaluable.

-For every subsequent Monster Jewel (you only need 4) follow the treasure chest guide.

-Open any chests that aren't out of the way if only for the party SP. You'll need a lot.

-Blaze through Lemuris (literally) and move on.

 

-Zoom through the Cardianon Mothership and Alternate Earth, opening any chest not way off the beaten path. You should still be strong enough to decimate bosses with ease.

-Bacchus is worthless so don't use him.

-There is a chest with EM Bombs on the CM that you should definately get.

 

-Roak takes a while just because there's so much to do.

-Get better weapons if you haven't done so already.

-Blindsides will destroy Black Eagle if you're having trouble with him.

-Buy 4 HP Boosts. Give one to Edge and Lymle, and hold off on the other 2. You need to get these pretty high up if not maxed out before Satanail, which is where the party SP comes in.

-Myuria is mostly worthless, but comes at a much higher level than the rest of your party.

-Make your way to the Purgatorium, the most annoying dungeon in my opinion.

-SAVE SAVE SAVE before Tamiel. I cannot emphasize this enough.

 

BOSS: TAMIEL. The hardest boss of the run. Your Ashley jewels have diminished in usefulness and Tamiel will not go down quickly. Kill 3 of his goons to leave 1 alive so that he doesn't respawn all 4. Then pound on him as much as you can. Once he starts using his laser beam attack, you're going to die pretty quickly. If you can whittle him down below 5-10k health, you've done good. You should be running low on party members, but it isn't over yet. Use your EM Bombs to deal the last of the damage. I literally was down to Myuria on both Universe and Chaos and used EM Bombs to get the kill both times.

 

-Onward and forward. Go to Aeos and give HP boost to Sarah when you get there and level it up a little, but save some SP.

-Your party at this point should be Edge, Lymle, Sarah, and Reimi.

-Before starting the Phantom Forces battle, level Sarah up one level to level 37. Your reward is Restoration. Max it out right away.

 

BOSS: PHANTOM FORCES. I would love to say there's a foolproof strategy to win this for you, but I honestly have no idea. Keep Sarah out of the way to heal and protect her. Use Fresh Sages if necessary. You will need them... a lot. Edge should be dealing the most damage so play as him. Odds are though it'll only be through critical hits. Be sure to have that skill set. Good luck.

 

-Get rid of Faize and gain Arumat, who should be given HP Boost as well.

-Your final party is Edge, Arumat, Lymle, and Sarah. All should have Ashley jewels.

-Go through the Miga Insect Warren. Shed a tear as you pass the Dragon Roar chest.

-Armaros Manifest is annoying, but should be doable with blindsides.

 

-EN II is easy, just be sure to keep up on the treasure chests for the SP.

-Kokabiel goes down easily as well. Just go nuts when she regenerates or whatever. Kill the spawns right as they spawn simply by continuing your rage.

 

-After the fight, get the Laser Weapon by doing the white orb's quest. Give it to Arumat.

 

-Go to Nox, then go to synthesis for possibly the first time.

-Synth a Light Gem (or something that adds the light attribute) to the Laser Weapon you just recieved. Also synth any spare Ashley jewels you may have.

 

-In the Palace of Creation, get the Holy Sword "Farewell" and ATK Boost for Edge. Max out ATK boost.

-When you get to the final save point, spend any remaining SP on HP Boost and attacks or healing spells.

 

-Sarah and Lymle should have nothing on but healing spells. They should be set to "Stay Out of Trouble."

-Edge should have whatever skill you think does the most damage.

-Arumat should have Unholy Maelstrom set.

 

FINAL BOSS: SATANAIL. Easy peasy. Take Edge or Arumat and lure him to one side of the arena. Meanwhile, park Sarah and Lymle on the other side. Attack the orbs for a while. Edge and Arumat will die a ton, but Sarah will constantly revive them. When you finally break the orbs, it's showtime. Take either one and simply start initiating rush combos ad nauseam. The light synth on the Laser Weapon and the Holy Sword "Farewell" add to your damage output since Satanail is weak to light. Sarah will never die and you should take him down eventually.

 

-Plug in a wired controller for the ending and come back in 50 minutes. Interestingly, you should get Arumat's ending even though you did no PAs.

 

-Unlock the achievement!!! Congrats!!!

 

Part X: THE END

 

Well, I sure hope you had as much fun with this game as I did. Looking back, I would do it again. I'm not particularly sure why, but all this planning and stuff is pretty fun. My knowledge of the game is fading, but I still remember most of it. And I still visit the Star Ocean board here whenever I see a new post.

 

Well, here's what I want from you: your time. Take your original save file that got 810+ of the battle trophies. Round that to the nearest hour, 251 for me. Next, take your Faize/Edge file. Find the difference between the final hour total and the save at the Phantom Forces battle, 85 for me. Next, add in your Universe and Chaos times, 8 and 7 respectively for me. Then, finally add in any misc time. Mine were: 1 hour getting Sarah's exact healing trophies while keeping the Silver Chalice and 2 hours of Satanail and the ending for the first time I beat the game. I don't count the ending the other 4 times since I didn't even watch. That adds up to 354 hours for me. I surely hope this guide helps someone beat that time, but as far as I know it's the fastest one out there.

 

And finally, I think a Chaos speed run of this game in about 5 hours (excluding the ending) is entirely possible. With a little planning and luck manipulation, I'd say it could be done. I don't have any means to record it, but if anyone is interested in planning a route I'd be happy to help.

 

Thanks for reading!

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Thank you for this! I definitely plan on using this guide while playing through! I played SO: TtEoT and it was my favorite RPG I've ever played. :) Really looking forward to getting a little back story. It's too bad that it's apparently the last Star Ocean title. :(

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  • 2 weeks later...

I really hate to double post, but I've just noticed that the latest edit to the guide was done yesterday (6/22/2011). I printed out this guide for off-line viewing on 6/14/2011. Is this guide considered finished? Should I just check back every once in a while?

GREAT guide by the way. I'm not sure I'd be able to tackle the 1000 without it! I've printed everything out, 3-hole punched everything and keep it all in a binder... two pens and a highlighter at the ready. My wife thinks I'm a dork!

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  • 2 weeks later...

There's a few things I might add to this.

 

First, mention the SRF/iron protector as something you want to save for when you have duplication. Someone might carelessly think they can sell this to the store without realizing you can't get the ingredients again. Along those lines, you should mention that nobody should sell anything unless they are maxed out on it to be sure it isn't something needed.

 

I would mention not to use ultimate bombs, you only get 2 in the game as far as I know and this is a good synthesis item

 

You mention not to do edge's coliseum trophies and such -but I disagree. Ideally, you should do EVERYONE's coliseum trophies as soon as you unlock it before the Faize switch. It's extremely boring, and I'll admit that I progressed to the Faize switch well before I got even close to finishing these, but to be totally efficient these should all be done before the switch so your progress is saved in both your main game and Faize game. You're going to have to do it anyway, and you might as well make things easier for yourself by having much higher BEAT ratings, higher levels, and enough battle coins to have bought several of the good items sold there for when you finally go back to your Faize game - you can breeze through the rest of the story if you spend a decent amount of time improving your characters there.

 

I also disagree with Faize being your main character before the Faize switch. You should absolutely make sure to get a kill on all enemy types you encounter, but other than that you should be playing Edge if you are fighting enemies you are sure Faize has landed the kill shot on, up until you get Arumat. This will make it that much faster when grinding Edge's 30,000 kills, since everything up until the Faize switch will count (you should still have Faize in the active party, of course, to progress towards his 3,000 battles achievement, but he does not need to be the leader to make progress on this).

 

I would also agree with lifeexpectancy in that you (can) work on a decent amount of item creation (mostly alchemy) while on ENII. If you combine this with your sanctuary runs to get blue roses, this takes almost no additional time than you would if you waited to get Lil' vending machine 3, since you are going to have to run back to the Calnus and right next to the item shop over and over again anyway.

 

On ENII to get the roses, your guide could use some improvement. You can actually get 2 blue roses per trip to the sanctuary if you discover the hidden harvesting point (in the inner area southwest of the gems, next to a broken piece of pillar or something). What I did was go to the sanctuary, save at the western save point, and then hit up the westernmost two harvesting points. Those are the only 2 out of the 4 that you can actually get blue roses. If you get one, run back to the west save point and save, then go to the other point and try and get another. Reload if you don't get a blue rose for each of these spots (upon reload, the stuff you harvest is re-randomized, so you can reload your save at the point in the sanctuary instead of having to go back to the ship like you say). Thus, you only need to go to the sanctuary 7 times total for blue roses including the first time you go when you fight the boss.

 

Other than that, this is a very handy guide.

Edited by VegaDark541
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  • 2 weeks later...
There's a few things I might add to this.

 

First, mention the SRF/iron protector as something you want to save for when you have duplication. Someone might carelessly think they can sell this to the store without realizing you can't get the ingredients again. Along those lines, you should mention that nobody should sell anything unless they are maxed out on it to be sure it isn't something needed.

 

Agreed.

 

I would mention not to use ultimate bombs, you only get 2 in the game as far as I know and this is a good synthesis item

 

I didn't use a single ultimate bomb in synthesis the entire time. Can you give me an example when they're even useful?

 

You mention not to do edge's coliseum trophies and such -but I disagree. Ideally, you should do EVERYONE's coliseum trophies as soon as you unlock it before the Faize switch. It's extremely boring, and I'll admit that I progressed to the Faize switch well before I got even close to finishing these, but to be totally efficient these should all be done before the switch so your progress is saved in both your main game and Faize game. You're going to have to do it anyway, and you might as well make things easier for yourself by having much higher BEAT ratings, higher levels, and enough battle coins to have bought several of the good items sold there for when you finally go back to your Faize game - you can breeze through the rest of the story if you spend a decent amount of time improving your characters there.

 

Disagreed. There's no reason to do it at a low level since you can't reliably one-shot the enemies. You may not have specific skills to work on at that point, Arumat needs to get to the top of the solo leaderboard, the items you can buy aren't that great, and of course, it's monotonous. The end of the game isn't so hard that you need to be overleveled to beat it. I beat Satanail at level 52 on Chaos with just a good strategy.

 

I also disagree with Faize being your main character before the Faize switch. You should absolutely make sure to get a kill on all enemy types you encounter, but other than that you should be playing Edge if you are fighting enemies you are sure Faize has landed the kill shot on, up until you get Arumat. This will make it that much faster when grinding Edge's 30,000 kills, since everything up until the Faize switch will count (you should still have Faize in the active party, of course, to progress towards his 3,000 battles achievement, but he does not need to be the leader to make progress on this).

 

Agreed. I guess that's what I meant actually... You're not really going to get a ton of kills though.

 

I would also agree with lifeexpectancy in that you (can) work on a decent amount of item creation (mostly alchemy) while on ENII. If you combine this with your sanctuary runs to get blue roses, this takes almost no additional time than you would if you waited to get Lil' vending machine 3, since you are going to have to run back to the Calnus and right next to the item shop over and over again anyway.

 

I'm gonna stick with my gut and say LVM3 is still faster. No offense to your opinion, I just genuinely think it is.

 

On ENII to get the roses, your guide could use some improvement. You can actually get 2 blue roses per trip to the sanctuary if you discover the hidden harvesting point (in the inner area southwest of the gems, next to a broken piece of pillar or something). What I did was go to the sanctuary, save at the western save point, and then hit up the westernmost two harvesting points. Those are the only 2 out of the 4 that you can actually get blue roses. If you get one, run back to the west save point and save, then go to the other point and try and get another. Reload if you don't get a blue rose for each of these spots (upon reload, the stuff you harvest is re-randomized, so you can reload your save at the point in the sanctuary instead of having to go back to the ship like you say). Thus, you only need to go to the sanctuary 7 times total for blue roses including the first time you go when you fight the boss.

 

Other than that, this is a very handy guide.

 

Well then, I had no idea there was a hidden harvest point. I knew about the mining one up there but that was the only one I ever found anywhere in the entire game. Thanks!

 

Guide is done through the Ethereal Queen. I am/have been extremely busy so sorry for taking so long.

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This guide is great! Thanks so much for the hard work. It has helped me quite a bit thus far.

 

Let me offer one little thing that may help with getting the EQ within 10 minutes. Make sure your BEAT is set to B for all characters. The extra HP comes in handy. More important, if it is leveled up to 20, the B BEAT should give you, among other helpful things, an additional chance of critical hits while Rush mode is active. So, as you said, don't initiate Rush combos as they take too long. However, always make sure Rush mode is activated (pushing "X"). I noticed a huge increase in how often I was doing criticals with Arumat. Gave me a pretty comfortable cushion to finish the EQ off with Lymle.

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As for the Ultimate Bomb, you can get a +35% HP damage to weapons effect which is the highest % of its kind, although there is some question as to what type of attacks actually do "HP" damage (i.e. just regular attacks, or symbols/spells as well?) so the usefulness of this factor is uncertain.

 

There's a good gamefaqs guide which actually lists all of the hidden mining/harvesting points, see here: http://www.gamefaqs.com/xbox360/946860-star-ocean-the-last-hope/faqs/56840

 

Also for the funeral bouquets, you can actually save, make only 6 of them, and hope you get a bonus item created via item creation if you are absolutely sick of returning to the sanctuary. If you don't get it, you can just reload. It should only take a few tries since creating 6 of an item gives a good chance of creating a bonus item. I actually use this tactic a lot when creating items for quests that I don't quite have enough of the base ingredients for, just reload if you don't create a bonus item.

 

One correction, you say "-Do not worry about Meracle's 5-minute-kill trophy just yet. You can get it on any of Gabe's forms." Her BT is actually for beating him in 10 minutes, not 5. I accidentally got this trophy my first time beating him when she was only level 200. In my current playthrough I have all chars level 255 before even beating Gabe, so I expect a reasonably easy battle with him (on Earth difficulty as well) although I haven't really snythed any godly gear yet other than exp gear.

Edited by VegaDark541
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first of all, great guide, very handy indeed, thanks for the great work

 

i was wondering though, do you have any intention of including some form of effiency guide for the battle trophies? e.g. what battle trophies to go for first and when? when to do exact damage battle trophies? etc

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first of all, great guide, very handy indeed, thanks for the great work

 

i was wondering though, do you have any intention of including some form of effiency guide for the battle trophies? e.g. what battle trophies to go for first and when? when to do exact damage battle trophies? etc

 

Yes, that's next. I've just been away and can only access the Internet at the occasional hotel on my iPod, which isn't the best way to write a guide... Rest assured though, more is coming.

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So this is 400 hours or less for all the achievements? Are you excluding BT's from that time?

 

Im thinking about going for this on the PS3 and this is the best guide out there. Nice work...a lot of printing :S

 

Also - are all these lists that require tracking also in the Star Ocean Strategy Guide? I'd like to get my hands on one of those if I decided to go for the platinum (1000 GS)

Edited by eburkulosis
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So this is 400 hours or less for all the achievements?
Yes

Are you excluding BT's from that time?
No

Im thinking about going for this on the PS3 and this is the best guide out there. Nice work...a lot of printing :S
Thanks

Also - are all these lists that require tracking also in the Star Ocean Strategy Guide? I'd like to get my hands on one of those if I decided to go for the platinum (1000 GS)
I have no idea... as far as I'm concerned there's enough resources on the web to get the job done without buying some fancy guide.

 

One correction, you say "-Do not worry about Meracle's 5-minute-kill trophy just yet. You can get it on any of Gabe's forms." Her BT is actually for beating him in 10 minutes, not 5. I accidentally got this trophy my first time beating him when she was only level 200. In my current playthrough I have all chars level 255 before even beating Gabe, so I expect a reasonably easy battle with him (on Earth difficulty as well) although I haven't really snythed any godly gear yet other than exp gear.
But wouldn't a 5 minute kill be more fun??? :p I changed it.

 

I added something!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

Still thinking about how to attack the battle trophy section...

Edited by dertswa687o
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  • 1 month later...
-Before going back to Aeos, complete the Astral Caves sidequest. Be certain to get the Cherished Bangle quest. It is missable.

Unless I'm missing something, you can't actually get either of these quests until you've been to Aeos. Being paranoid about the quest expiring though, I completed 'A Cherished Bangle' before Arumat joined the party.

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Unless I'm missing something, you can't actually get either of these quests until you've been to Aeos. Being paranoid about the quest expiring though, I completed 'A Cherished Bangle' before Arumat joined the party.

 

I'm confused. You can go do the Astral Caves before going back to Aeos from Roak. And I guess I should mention that the quest is only available your first time through the Astral Caves. As in, it doesn't expire by going too far in the story.

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Lias wouldn't give me either the 'Ogre Hunting' or 'Rumble in the Caves' quests either after defeating Tamiel or after returning to the ship (but not going anyway). It wasn't until I went to Aeos and immediately returned that he would give me each of those quests.

 

But I guess if it expires after your first visit to the Astral Caves, then it doesn't really matter too much when that first visit is, so it's not a big deal :p

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A lot of the quests expire, which pretty much prevents you from doing that. A lot of the quests that don't expire become a whole lot easier later on though, either due to oneshotting everything that gets in your way, or due to having the Duplication skill to save hours of farming.

 

So basically yeah, if you do all the missable stuff, you can rush through and return to the rest later

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