Disgaea -Hour of Darkness

[SuperBrother]

Not a clue about the spell hits TBH, I've really only messed around with healing and support magics at the mo.

I got in another 4 or so hours last night, got to chapter 2, Laharl is Lv. 10, Etna 8, Brawler 8, Warrior 6, Cleric 6, Prinnies 3 (not used much TBH).
I can now make rogues, scouts, pugilists and a few other new ones so I will have a muck around with that later.

Just a quick Q on item world, is it worth my time upgrading low level swords and axes (ninja sword, bronze axe etc.) or should I wait until the better stuff is available?

[Bassman]

You will find it easier to upgrade the low level items (also with a higher Rarity number if possible).

I think my Prinnies are up to Level 7. I gave my Mage an expensive bow but I don't seem to get a large number of hits. I may swap it for the slightly inferior bow my Sniper has which gives much better results (I did get a decent pair of glasses which maybe helps).

I have so far struggled with Item World, but with my latest Level ups I think I may find it easier. I have a very strong Amulet to show for my efforts though on one successful trip which I had to abort (in the sense I went for the gate to the next level a couple of times) at Level 8.

[MartyG]

The reason for different results in magic is different creatures have different levels of resistance to different types of magic.

Here's one Laharl I did earlier. Actually much early, his attack is 311K now.

[Bassman]

That Laharl must have been after a "few weeks" playing!

I can see there would be differences with magic in different environments with different creatures, but this was on the same map with the same creatures every time, hence my puzzlement.

[SuperBrother]

From what I've seen the magic resistances of the creatures are random, certainly in the progression exams (if only ranging between +50% to -50%) then again I've only been playing for 6 hours or so......

Had a right laugh last night mucking around in item world throwing geosymbols into enemies to start chains - I managed to get a 4 colour/1000+ chain wiping out my entire party in the process, but as I wiped out everything else I still passed the floor and had to do the rest with prinnies, needless to say I didn't last the next floor

[Bassman]

I've not tried throwing geo symbols at enemies. I think my main characters would have survived that without too much effort. How high are your HP?

You can get a pretty good chain reaction going on the tutorial map you can revisit. You can wipe out all bar two enemies and get the Bonus count up to 3.

I think I get an improved fire spell on Level 20 so I will try for that as a first priority tonight. The other two classes of Mage might be worthwhile as well, though it will take a while to get them to a decent level.

[SuperBrother]

Throwing (or tossing as sometimes stated in the strategy guide ) is so deep!
You can throw an enemy into a geosymbol (and vice versa) destroying both immediately, if the symbol or enemy was on a geopanel the chains begin, this can be really handy. I imagine it's possible to carry a geosymbol around the map and throw a few turns later to take out difficult enemies.

My party at the mo HP wise is something like Laharl 140ish, and the others a bit less - time for some levelling tonight!

[Bassman]

I am not sure you are allowed to be carrying anything at the end of your turn.

There are some useful prizes to be had from the hospital in terms of attribute improvers (that is why my mage has high SP and HP) after a fair amount of use.

[SuperBrother]

I ended up carrying another party member at the end on my turn and the bottom character got damaged.......strange.

[E. Randy Dupre]

If you've got a character who's still lifting something at the end of a turn, they'll suffer damage.

Just a quick Q on item world, is it worth my time upgrading low level swords and axes (ninja sword, bronze axe etc.) or should I wait until the better stuff is available?

It's definitely worth it. As you get to the lower floors, the Bonus Chain prizes improve. Go into a basic weapon, and you should be able to get hold of items of one or two ranks higher. I've not bought a single weapon from the shop in 100hrs of playing, because I've got much more impressive and powerful kit from constantly playing through Item World. Note that you can't get Rares or Legends from the shop, either - the only way to get hold of those is as Bonus Chain prizes or through stealing them.

[SuperBrother]

That makes sense then. I'll try picking a crap item with good residents, go through subdue them then transfer them to any decent stuff I find.

[Hannibal]I just love it when a plan comes together![/Hannibal]

[Bassman]

I've had all my Rares and Legedarys from the first 2 chapters of the game. I have yet to work out what possible use my Legendary Slippers are going to be to me...

I must admit I am impressed by Flonne. She gives 86 Healing Points currently (the joys of levelling up) to all the squares around her. I have only healed the enemy as well once... so far!

I presume it is cheaper to use spells for healing rather than pay at the hospital if the opportunity to use them is available.

[SuperBrother]

Man, they should have called this game Crackgea - I'm having withdrawl symptoms here...............

[Bassman]

I can't wait until tonight to see what I can do about getting a Level 10 item. After getting a Level 20 Mage of course!.

I think you can only transfer residents to an item you have visited befoe.

[Saurian]

Best way to level up mages early on I found was Jotunheim, Terrible Cold (if I remember right) - the stage where all but 1 square has invincibility applied. You can use this stage to lump all enemies together into 1 strong enemy, put them on the non invincible square and batter till dead.

The trick I used to make mages and other classes level up very fast was to apply a high level Armsmaster to a sword and repeatedly slash an ally without counter until weapon mastery went up till Winged Slayer is learnt, to power-up and add more spells just keep casting em until you get them. Also You can combine all the enemies and simply carry the combined one with someone to cancel it's turn, attack someone holding someone to cancel counters (they are invincible after all) Now you can do 2 things:

1. With sword weapon mastery at that level you can kill a high level enemy easily with a mage using the sword rather than low level spells, get 5 people to cast Braveheart on the character to double attack power if not enough
2. By the time you get to Cave Of Ordeals III (best levelling stage in the game if all characters have sword mastery to the level where Winged Slayer is available as a command you can go up hundreds of levels each turn if you have a good/high level sword + statistician applied.

Dont go on a long ting at the start trying to get all mage classes up early on, you can do that in about 1/2 hour once you open up Cave of Ordeal 3. It's worth using Jotunheim to learn command skills with every character, get your Axe and sword users weapon mastery above lv15 at least!