tactics ogre... anything I need to know?

[nhbdy]

Hello all, as some may recall, I am a huge fan of FFT, I had heard rumors of a game by the same people (not square in general, but the specific team) that was supposedly very good, this game was tactics ogre, I was able to track it down and am playing the PS1 version if it matters...

My question is this, given the history I've had in FFT, where there are things you can do to make an unwinnable game (looking at you weigraf) and the like, or any other miscellaneous tips you can provide, but please, no spoilers.

[T.G. Oskar]

PS1, you say?

For starters, you need to know about Lawful, Neutral and Chaotic (the route, not the alignments). If you haven't finished Chapter 1, perhaps you won't realize it, but at one point in the game you'll make a decision that will define the next two Chapters. All I'll say is that being Lawful requires "following orders" and that being Chaotic is "doing what you think is right". This will be a mild spoiler, but you MUST know which path to follow. Generally, Lawful > Chaotic, because of the character choices.

You should have at least one spellcaster of each element, and at least one of each class.

Lawful characters can become Swordmasters, which can learn a single spell. Make that spell Charge (which you can buy after...Chapter 4 begins, IIRC). That will make MANY missions a joke.

Unlike in FFT, where you can steal items, in TO items are gained by means of random chance. If an enemy has a good thing, make sure that it drops a bag, and that nobody takes that bag unless it's on your side. Some very good weapons can be found this way.

FFT has Deep Dungeon; TO has the Hell Gate. Many of the best weapons, armor, and even some special abilities can be found in the Hell Gate, although the enemies are almost impossibly hard.

Have a second save. There are a few back-to-back battles, particularly on those that deal with castles (Amorika, then later Coritani, Heim and Banisha). These battles might be a tad difficult, but not much.

Unlike in FFT, if one of your party members dies, you have until the end of the battle to revive it or you lose it forever. Undead ALWAYS revive, unless you use Exorcism (there's a high-level spell that does something similar, but...it's a high level spell).

Archers are godlike in this game. Give them a good bow, and let them get the higher ground. Since you can attack outside the range of the bow, the higher you are from the enemy the longer the bow can shoot, and bows use Dexterity for damage, that means you deal insane amounts of damage with a single shot. Ninjas are secondary badasses, because they can walk in water and attack with two equipped weapons.

[Keld Denar]

Look up a guide that gives build progression. You need to groom your troops Ali and Cha as they level so that they are ready for the upgrades you want them to have as soon as they level. This gives better all around stat allocation for your vanilia (non-named) troops. Also, figure out what troops recruit what other troops. Generally, a recruited wizard will have better stat allocation than a wizard who spent half of his childhood as a fighter.

Even if you want a "good" ending, make a unit with undead. They'll be GREAT for 2 things. First of all, they are godly for defending cities you take mid game, since they tend to be nearly invincible against most foes. Secondly, they are also good for "soaking" XP. I generally like to kill ALL enemy units on a map. It makes me feel good, and it also gives you the best odds for random drop items, especially late game. Unfortunately, that means that some of your high Ali groups start to get a bit overleveled. Overleveled groups beating up on lower level tend to suffer Cha hits, and eventually Ali hits. Ali is hard enough to raise without it getting lowered. This goes EXTRA for your lord unit, since he HAS to be out every fight. Leave him to guard the base after about the 3rd or 4th map, and he'll only fight 2-3 fights per map, depending on how well you deploy. Don't ever let units run away to rerecruit. Follow them if you can and wipe them out. Not doing so will force you to kill extra men on a map. You only get item drops from clearing a unit, so killing the extra men will simply make XP add up which might be bad (see above).

If you are trying to raise your Rep, try not to cap any cities at the start. Its often difficult to hold cities while you are pushing toward your foe's base. Once you have your foes base surrounded, or at least suitable pinch points dominated, THEN go back with a high Ali unit to liberate cities. That makes your Rep go up a LOT, especially if their Ali is near 100. For best results, recruit a couple of flying characters who can be leaders and raise their Ali as high as possible and use THEM to liberate cities. They cost you very little cash to field, cover a lot of ground quickly, and people will like them. Unfortunately, this makes most of your units miss out on the boons that occur when you draw tarot cards, but they also miss out on the penalties, so thats nice. Another trick is that you can milk the money system a little. Once the enemy city stops sending out units (you killed them all), send all of the units you used in conquest home. With most of your army gone, let a couple days pass, soaking up the cash. Don't do this for TOO long, or you'll start taking Rep hits, but generally you can make up 10+ rep in the next map, so a little Rep damage doesn't hurt too bad. Once a couple of days pass, swoop in and kill the boss unit and finish the map. If you have to return to a map, try to do so with only your lord unit, or possibly with one of your flying liberation units. Visiting maps you've conquered often gives you rewards, but don't dally too much or you'll actually lose money since you are fielding an army without income (cities only pay you the first time you liberate them).

Finally, I'm going to make an assumption that Tactics Ogre works very similar to Ogre Battle. In OB, killing units with tarot cards is BAD, since all of the XP for killing the foe goes to your lord. This can cause overleveling (see above). If you send in an underleveled team and you think they are going to have a rough fight, open with a tarot card. This might give your team a slight edge to knock off a foe or two quickly, thus denying your opponents team precious actions which can turn the tide. I don't know if this mechanic is in all versions of the game, but it is kinda annoying, and better when you know it. Know what cards do what, and don't be afraid to use them, you'll pick up a lot, especially if you follow the above stategy of "conquer, then liberate". You can also buy items to get extra tarot cards, and the items are generally DIRT cheap compared to the awesomeness of most tarot cards.

EDIT: Hmmmm, it looks like some aspects of Tactics Ogre are different from Ogre Battle. I made some assumptions based on that. If any of the information doesn't make sense at all, just disregard it, because it means that I'm dumb.

[nhbdy]

ok, so should I pick one alignment (was doing lawful before I read this) and only have troops of that type, or should I mix and match, since it apparently effects class choice? and to keld, I'm sorry but most of it was not understandable, but seeing as I have next to 0 experience with the game I am sure that if any is accurate it is due to that, what is Ali and Cha?

[Keld Denar]

Alignment and Charisma. A quick look at a Tactics Ogre website kinda shows me that 80% of what I typed isn't applicable, so pretty much just ignore it.

Oopse...

[tyckspoon]

ok, so should I pick one alignment (was doing lawful before I read this) and only have troops of that type, or should I mix and match, since it apparently effects class choice? and to keld, I'm sorry but most of it was not understandable, but seeing as I have next to 0 experience with the game I am sure that if any is accurate it is due to that, what is Ali and Cha?

I think most of it isn't actually relevant to you, since the Ogre Battle and the Tactics Ogre lines use pretty different mechanics. ALI and CHA might carry over, tho (it's been a rather long time since I poked into Tactics Ogre.) Ali is Alignment; it measures how 'good' the unit is. High-Ali units are usually better-liked by NPCs, and can class-change into good-themed upgrades (for example, the basic soldier route for high alignment is Soldier -> Knight -> Paladin, at least in Ogre Battle), while low-Ali units are 'evil' and can class-change into more unsavory types (Soldier -> Wizard is probably the most important low-Ali branch.) Alignment is mostly changed by what you kill; if you murder a lot of Clerics and 'good' monsters (Faeries, Angels and the like) your Ali will drop. If you destroy 'evil' beings (Wizards, Demons, Hellhounds, other evil-branch class variants, and especially Undead) your Ali climbs pretty fast.

[Vincent2211]

Alignment (L N C), Sex, and stats are what determine what classes you can change to. Stat growth is determined by class (example, a soldier [basic class] became a ninja then became a wizard will have better speed and dex while having slightly lower int than a pure wizard; the only exception in Denim [main char] who always gets the lord's [special class] stat growth regardless of his actual class in the fourth chapter). Ninjas are a good class (high speed=more action/good dex=hits more often and does more damage with bows/decent int and str/they are a bit fragile though). Archers are probably the best class in the game (female only, high dex, good speed, insane damage and range with bows late-game while never missing. Fairies can be good (interesting specials, slightly lower dex than archers while having higher speed, low hp though). Terror Knights are good melee units (cause fear, good physical stats, middling speed, need a C-aligned male and 30 kills). Incidentally, you can't really change anyone's alignment except the main character's and the associated special characters whose alignment his determines.
Chaos frame management is needed to get the best ending. The Chaos Frame (you never see it in any menu, but it and story events determine your ending) is controlled by having units of races that hate each other kill each other while avoiding killing members of their own race (and making story decisions that are in alignment or opposed to that peoples beliefs). You can see what race your members are in their statistics screen (it will say something like Galgastani or Balmustran or Balboede to use a few examples).

[nhbdy]

gorramit... well I just realized my game has a fatal error... it cannot load... so much for that...

EDIT: with the proper application of a hammer and the interwebs, I have solved my problem

things I have learned thus far:

Level gap is huge, a level 2 person can barely scratch a level 4, and the exp gains for attacking lower levels is really low, will have to obsessively manage this in training.

Stat management is crucial, I should have a plan for each character as soon as I can swap classes and stick to it