Disgaea -Hour of Darkness

[Bassman]

I wodered what I needed to do. I knew the Senators did get revived. Thought it easier to reload. The "vote" the second time was far easier anyway. Wonder how long before I can finish of that 3x3 at CoO 3 in one turn...

[E. Randy Dupre]

Bloody hell. I've beaten Baal, I've got a Yo****suna and Super Robo Suit, I've seen five of the endings, I've notched up 136 hours...

But I never realised that if you press R2 on any Item World map, the cursor automatically cycles between the dimensional gate and base panel. Knowing that would have cut down on all my fruitless searching. Why can't people write game manuals that actually include useful information?

[fearbat]

Bloody hell. I've beaten Baal, I've got a Yo****suna and Super Robo Suit, I've seen five of the endings, I've notched up 136 hours...

But I never realised that if you press R2 on any Item World map, the cursor automatically cycles between the dimensional gate and base panel. Knowing that would have cut down on all my fruitless searching. Why can't people write game manuals that actually include useful information?

I've spent over 110 hours on this and only recently found the same thing out!

[Bassman]

I think I found that out the other day.

I think my slowness was probably down to a lot of early levelling up. I am on Episode 8 after about 5 hours of cycle 2.

[The Sheriff of Nottingham]

Managed to finish Episode 4 last night so now I'm gearing up for some serious levelling in Jotunheim. Right now Laharl is level 21, Rouge (my brawler) 17, Etna 16 and the others in the low teens. I'm only managing to play this game in fits and starts due to work and family commitments but when I get a chance for some gaming its the only choice right now. At this rate it will last me years...

[fearbat]

I'm being distracted by Tales of Symphonia right now(purposefully as well, I was spending FAR to much time on Disgaea), but as soon as I'm done with that I'm going straight back to this. My Strategy Guide came yesterday mourning, it's the official one by double Jump and seems pretty light actually. Transmigration for one isn't touched upon hardly AT ALL. It does have some lists of all the weapons and classes though, which will come in very handy.
BTW I can't believe for a game that has so many intricacies, the manual is so bad. I understand they don't want to spoil the game, but they could of given explanations and good examples of certain aspects to get you on the right track. Even after over 130 hours played the choices available are overwhelming, I'm glad for the guide at least as now I can mull over what to aim for.

[Moodmon]

Managed to finish Episode 4 last night so now I'm gearing up for some serious levelling in Jotunheim. Right now Laharl is level 21, Rouge (my brawler) 17, Etna 16 and the others in the low teens. I'm only managing to play this game in fits and starts due to work and family commitments but when I get a chance for some gaming its the only choice right now. At this rate it will last me years...

You are at exactly the same position as me. Well, nearly. I'm on the good levelling up level in Jotunheim, and I don't intend to leave it for some time. Mainly because Laharl is only at around level 15, Etna 13, ignore the prinny squad (even if I went into item world to level up their rubbish weapons) and my three wind, fire and ice mages are around 14.

Had a quick go, got my fire mage to kill a level 28 thing, and she went up two levels in one go. [Fonz]Eyyyyy[/Fonz]

[Bassman]

After reducing the enemy strength I managed to gain a "foothold" in the Cave of Ordeal 3. Some serious levelling and some re-strengthened enemies I now have my main Mage on Lvl 1000 having transmigrated twice at Lvl 1000. I have over 200,000,000 in the bank (really ought to stop buying weapons I am unlikely to use just because they look useful). Now up to about 136 hours.

Here are the stats of my Lvl 1000 Mage the first time she got there:

HP 21230
SP 14237
ATK 4516
INT 14925
DEF 3797
SPD 5672
HIT 6500
RES 10927

After transmigrating and returning to Lvl 1000 we get

HP 44758
SP 20705
ATK 8751
INT 22449
DEF 8318
SPD 10637
HIT 11996
RES 18071

After a further transmigration at Lvl 1000 the stats on my return to Lvl 1000 were:

HP 53938
SP 25562
ATK 10849
INT 28016
DEF 10503
SPD 13035
HIT 15456
RES 20841

It is a pain to get back up to that level (5 or more hours) but the stats speak for themselves. I now need to work on my other characters I think as I won't be transmigrating the mage for a while.

[E. Randy Dupre]

It is a pain to get back up to that level (5 or more hours)

You *really* need to take Saur's advice on this one - grab a powerful sword, equip it with some Gladiators and Statisticians, get your characters' sword mastery up to the level required for Winged Slayer (12, I think, but I might be wrong) and use that instead.

Five hours is way too long to take leveling to 1000 on CoO3. It can be done in a fraction of that.

<edit> Actually, I'm not sure I understand why it's taking so long. Have you got any statisticians equiped?

[MartyG]

It can be done in 20 minutes using the above technique - you really should be equiping a lvl 300 statistician.

[Saurian]

Just some incase you're having problem levelling up quickly:

Braveheart and MagicBoost:
Make sure you have at least 5 characters (not including Laharl) who have Braveheart and Magicboost magic learnt. A fast way to get characters to learn the move is as follows:

1. Pick a character
2. Have that character create a Red Mage at good for nothing level.
3. Name the mage the same as the character with an X on the end or something, this lets you know who the Mage's master is without having to look at status.
4. Do this for 5 or more of your characters
5. Level up the mage using her master for combo attacks on enemies with decent exp gain (Celestia stage 1 for example) until they all level up a few times and learn Braveheart and MagicBoost. Cave of Ordeal is best as you only have to make 1 kill with the mages in combo and they all level - you can set it up so all five will level up in one turn.
6. Go to the first real stage Magnificent Gate - now stand the master next to student for all the characters in question and make the masters cast Braveheart and MagicBoost constantly on anyone until they all get it to level 1 (doesnt take long)
7. Once you have got Braveheart to level 1 with all masters - go to the castle and delete the mages.

If you cast this spell 5 times on someone it will double attack (Braveheart) or double magic power (MagicBoost). For Cave Of Ordeal with weaker characters the setup would be 5x Braveheart > Winged Slayer - for mages 5x Magic Boost > powerful 3x3 magic.

[Bassman]

Close... its actually 236 hours playing).

My problem is that I am using a Mage and the best I can manage after the initial burst is about 10 levels a hit. I have been using the Magicboost. I'm not that sure of the effect of a statisician on magic users.

This time I haven't transmigrated again (for the moment and am currently at Lvl 1112). I have been boosting the items for intelligence (still need some work there I suspect). The enemy strength is at the level where you get about 1,900,000 HL per visit of CoO 3. The advantage of a mage is I move them away to the limit of their range and the enemies sit still waiting to be disposed of. I am up to the point of being able to wipe them on a boosted Star (Lvl 34 I think) amazingly Tera is not that much better.

At least tonight I completed the Cave of Ordeal (the last two bosses fortunately were of the sit and wait for it brigade!! At least I had two rogue type characters to reach the Zombie.

I also opened up Human World and Alternate Netherworld so that will make a change.

I think I must be going for the 100 persuaded issues at the Assembly ending!!!

Managed to boost my party with some Tailrings and a Succubus. Strongest is a Lvl 360 (now) Tailring which is useful on some of the stronger items at the Item World. I will need to boost a sword user to get some serious levels at the CoO 3 so as to assist as well. Favourite would be my Blademaster as it is at the highest level.

[eastyy]

hmm what alot of reviews dont mention in my opinion is how good the story and the cutscenes are played out there are some very funny moments


clocked up 75 hrs so far and still have a lot more to findout

[Bassman]

Yes, I love ths story line. I am only on my second time through and hopefully will get a different ending. There are still areas for me to unlock.

[Moodmon]

My forced break from the net has made my play this pretty much non stop. I'm up to the end of chapter 6, and am levelling up some items before I take on Mid-Boss. Making sure my mages have some decent armour for once.

That Jout-thingy level is excellent for levelling up. Thinking of finally creating some warriors or brawlers, as bar Laharl and Hoggmeister I have no strength up front (three mages, and all the other story/starting characters).

Hopefully, by the time I've done all that, and levelled them up to level 25-ish I can start beating the story a bit quicker. I want to beat it, or at least get this CoO3 open so I can level up. Not too bothered about getting Staticians yet.

Shame the manual isn't too hot on telling you what all the specialists do. Glad someone posted it in this thread a while back