U's Journal: Bravely Second Megathread

And I thought I've been playing too much.
You nerds!

Guilty, but I'm house-sitting and don't have a lot to do after my Pathfinder group was done for this week's session so...

Also so glad they added a Scan option via Magnifying Glass items. Don't have to waste a slot on Miscellany (not that Halfsies or Mimic are bad, mind you) instead of something else. And for that matter, that scan results stay between fights!

Does this game have the same problem the first one did where it became extremely repetitive about half way through?

Haven't gotten far enough to tell you, but no, I don't think it has the same issue.

Those aside, for those who were having problems late-game original BD, I tended to find this set to work best for me:

1) Dark Knight + Piracy (with Atk+30%, Two-Handed, and Hawkeye) for pure damage. Piracy was nice for knocking down stats (particularly Def and Mdef, though Atk and Matk as needed), and then once I was set up, Dark Bane/Black Bane were usually sufficient in most cases. I liked to use a katana as my choice of weapon for two-handing.

2) Spiritmaster + White Magic (with Holy One, Healing Lore, Attack Item Amp, and Speed+20%). Paired with Dark Knight and with Hermes Sandals to make sure she's faster, Adaptationx4 + Dark Nebulax4 = 9999 damage to non-Dark-absorbing enemies, and 9999 healing to the party. Otherwise, between Holy One and Healing Lore, I could just use the Blessed Shield (On Use: Cura) to keep up HP without having to use any MP, and I'd pop attack items for damage with the right elemental staves dual-wielded. Thank heaven for same-turn equipment changes!

3) Vampire + Hunting (With Monster Ability Up, Absorb P. Damage, and Attack+30%). Despite being a Blue Mage, most of Vampire's Vampirism abilities are actually considered physical damage! Fireball is nice because it ignores Default, and Fire tends to be a modestly common weakness. Abilities like White Wind are nice, as are spells like Curse (Atk and Def down). I'd also use stat absorbs to weaken enemies when paired with my Dark Knight to cripple foes while buffing my Vampire, and Magic Thirst to keep MP up. I'd have Hunting for specific-target damage as well.

4) Ninja + Sword Magic (With Sword Magic Amp, Transcience, Comeback Kid, and Speed +20%). Lets you exploit weaknesses with Sword Magic (especially once you have Holy and Dark to complete your elemental availabilities), but more importantly, Utsusemi + Comeback Kid + Transcience means you dodge an attack thrown at you (especially if you lure it your way with Kairai), get a 25% Atk and Matk boost for 3 turns, and counterattack with a full-power physical attack.

As you can see, I play more of a slow-and-steady pace for the most part as opposed to a damage rush, to ensure that I can stay alive at all costs. My Dark Knight and Vampire do the majority of my damage, with my Ninja as support damage and counter-tanking with Kairai. Spiritmaster either throws items or, more likely, just uses a Blessed Shield for AoE healing without having to use MP for anything besides Adaptability or the occasional Esunaga. (also keeps on her the staves that cast Esuna and Raise)

Double post, but I have to say, I underestimated the Spellcraft system and its versatility. Why? Because it works with all types of magic, not just Spirit (not 100% sure on summon yet, but about to find out!). Some useful combinations I've done:

Aspir + Mist on enemies = AoE Aspir to AoE restore party MP over time. Small amounts but useful enough.

Aspir + Hammer on mages = physical damage on magic-strong targets, makes your Aspir work that much more potently.

Holy Night + Mist = Casts Holy Night on your party at the start of every turn as long as Mist is active. I bet this can be used with Protect/Shell for great effect for gradual Def/Mdef Boosters.

Cure/Cura/etc + Mist = Gradual HP Regen by casting the cure spell again and again at the start of each turn.

Cures/Esuna/Raise + Dart = Start-of-turn Cures, Raises, status removals, etc. Use Esuna before your confused ally gets a chance to attack you, or Cure to save a critical member before a fast enemy rushes them.


Ohjeez, got the Summoner Asterisk while typing this, and Spellcraft DOES work with Summon. Some observation:

Dart: fast, high-damage elemental hits. (Hresvelgr Dart did >1200 damage to an Imperial Desert Stave, which is magic resistant to begin with).

Needle: Keeps it AoE to the same type of mob with a notable damage boost. (~1400 damage as opposed to ~5-600 damage)

Hammer: Convert high magic damage to high physical damage. Those mages aren't going to be smiling after this hits them.

Mist: Deals pretty powerful AoE damage to all targets at the start of each turn. Hit for ~5-600 on each target, about the same damage as a summoning, but for multiple turns. Not bad!

Wall: Counters with a single-target copy of the summon at normal damage. Not really fantastic as it did ~5-600, but against a good number of physical hits it can rack up the damage over time. Maybe good for a boss that uses AoE physical hits?

Blast: AoE damage with a boost (~1000ish damage), so roughly a 66% damage gain at a 37.5% cost boost. Not bad.

The one downside is that it's very costly to do Summon-craft, but perhaps with a Red Mage's MP Free in a Pinch it could be great for fast kills or just general raw damage. Either way, I love the possibilities that Spellcraft opens up!

I've already decided that Yew will be the healer *** who will play all the support classes throughout the game. That's what he gets for being a nerd.

Yew was the first person to get into the Red Mage outfit for me, and let me tell you... Fabulous. He could be the next DeRosa. :U

Other than that, I've had him go Gladiator -> Red Mage and he's back in Gladiator now. Might drop a few levels into Wizard for Spellcraft though... and I did the cliche game thing of making my gals into the mages again, but at least it's a mix of Wizard/Red Mage/Summoner for one and Wizard/Bishop/Astrologian for the other. And my last guy (you know who!) has been on Fencer since I got it with a dash of Wizard from an Ablinked friend for Spellcraft, because Fencer is awesome. >.> Blazing Wolf for that 25% Atk/Matk boost means that he's a nice balanced-type damage-dealer, especially since his Ablinked Spellcraft goes up to Blast/Wall.

My girls are badass warriors whilee my guys are mages lol

The multiplier caps at 3.0 for battles.

Ugh, they nerfed the "blue mage" of this game. Catmancer for one, which just makes me cringe. But while you can immediately see a list of what abilities are available and what you can learn them from, using your "Catmancy"(*cringe*) requires you to use consumable cat food items... ugh. I feel very, very sad. :(

So now we have to buy cat food (I cannot stop being sad that I have to be a cat Blue Mage) to use our spells at all along with having to learn them. So ridiculous.

So I found a super good place to grind.

I haven't quite gotten to the point of getting grind-happy yet, just kind of trying to get a spread of good jobs at the moment. Currently running:

-Catmancer (cringe, but the h2h damage cannot be denied) with Spirit Magic + Spellcraft for some versatile damage between Perforate (damage + Pdef down) and Spirit Magic combos, and buff/support from White Wind and Panzerleid or w/e.
-Red Mage with Summon Magic + Spellcraft (Spellcraft OP on Summon Magic, btw) for pure damage output with some backup healing (Cura Mist, or Cura Blast for undead, as well as Esuna/Raise/Cura Dart).
-Bishop with Astrology and Spellcraft for pure support (Astrology + Mist is nice for over-time buffing or longer buffs).
-Hawkeye with Fencing, nothing like Blazing Wolf + Harpoon + Warhead to make for some serious firepower, and rifles are nothing to sneeze at. Definitely loving Hawkeye so far.

What kind of setups are you guys running in general? I just got to Grapp Keep so I'm going to be making the Black Mage/Ranger choice soon, but this set has worked for the most part for me.

Right now I'm running,

Wizard/SMN
Wizard/RDM
Fencer/Chariot
Fencer/Chariot

Both Fencers have a sword on their heads lol.

I bought this new game but haven't played it yet... I'm struggling to get thru the first game, already my 5th time doing the same damn thing. How many times do you have to do this ><

'til about Chapter... 8, I think? But you don't have to go after the optional bosses. It's good for extra storyline/training, but there's nothing crucial about it. You can just skip to the crystals each time.

Or, if you want an alternate ending, shatter a crystal. All sorts of fun. :D

I have a very basic setup lol:

Anyone notice the dungeon music is from the remastered FFIII?

Game seems a bit "grindy" in the obscenely low JP rate monsters give you if you don't chain. They really want you to spam lower level mobs it seems.

It's worth it. It's a slog, but it pays off story-wise. Hang in there.


I'm not getting the time to play Bravely Second like I want to yet, so my progress has been very slow. So far I've only unlocked the very first asterisk, and now I'm at the boss fight in the first real dungeon setting which I assume unlocks another. @3 party members now too!



I thought it sounded familiar.
Well, that's a fast way to do it lol.
In the first game I just used that one Conjurer ability that KOs weak enemies at the start of the battle.

I noticed they completely removed the Random Encounter option....the option to turn the encounter rate up or down/off. That was an option I dearly loved in the first game ; ;

It's not gone, it's just removed until you get your fourth character who gives you the ability. Hang in there!

BLESSINGS UPON YOU AND YOUR FAMILY

Via Jedi mind powers...

Exactly what I thought, complete with an additional "...what."

And double posting because wat.

Any reason to pair astrology with witchcraft?

Fighting this long chain of 4 mobs at a time..
at the end Magnolia gets confuse status and runs away.

I got so mad lol.

For Astrology + Spellcraft: Hells yeah. Some good uses:

Buff + Blast = AoE Buff (Astral Magic can't be multi-target cast iirc, so this can be done with 2 total BP instead of 4, and save you a lot of MP).
Buff + Mist = Over-time reduced buff, greater over-time potency (Mist+Evade Boon = 10%/turn for a cap of 40% as opposed to a 25% immediately from Blast)
Buff + Dart = Start-of-turn buff that could save your skin, like putting up Magic Mirror to stop a caster from nuking a weakened character, or boosting attack/magic before an attack.
Magic Mirror + Needle/Blast/Dart = Cast on a target or group of targets to negate their support magic. I know I used it on those... Frostis, I think it was? They'd cast Cura and Protect on themselves and their party, you could reflect those back on your own guys.

As for charm and confuse, I've had my own fun with that more than a few times. :( Like the freaking Patassier kept Charming my Ninja, who would love to use Shippujinrai to go even before my Esuna Dart... and usually liked to focus on the person who was going to remove it! I nearly wiped because Yew kept killing Magnolia. xD

Looking forward to try Fencing+Bushido! *_* looks like such a fun combination!!