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Hard mode Laguz advice/suggestions?


Errorik
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I've beaten RD hard many times, but I usually ignore most of the Laguz besides the obvious ones (Volug, royals). I'm looking to do a run with a few Laguz substituting beorc units. Any recommendations or tips? I plan on playing efficiently, but not LTC (Aka no glare/boss grinding but also not skipping chests etc to save turns).

 

Here's the info I'm working with so far.

Laguz I know are great: Janaff, Ulki, Skrimir, and Volug. Janaff just needs one BEXP level up for Tear and can use halfshift for 2-3 chapters. Ulki is just a little bit worse. I don't know which one I'd slap adept on. Probably Janaff? They both want S rank. Skrimir also does well with halfshift + resolve. He has some good bases. Volug has great availability, hits S rank early, and is earth affinity.

Laguz I'm unsure about: Lethe, Maurim, Mordecai, Ranulf, Naeluchi. Maurim has some good bases and growths but that availability is abysmal. Lethe seems bad at everything, besides availability. Mordecai seems speed ruined but has good bases and availability. Ranulf is a cat but has great bases, though that high level eats his xp gain. Naeluchi has kinda low stats but can get S rank and has at least some availability.

Laguz I'm pretty sure are not worth it: Kyza, Lyre, Vika. Vika has abysmal availability and has bad stats. I don't see her ever being good. Kyza seems like he is behind and I'd be better off using a different tiger. I've heard Lyre can be decent due to her high skill for Satori usage, but she is still a cat and starts off bad.

 

I'm ignoring the dragons because I don't really consider end game to be a part of the game. I also don't mind just replacing my used Laguz with royals if things don't turn out well. Also herons are herons. Would it be worth getting herons to learn the full Laguz gauge skill? I've always thought it was kinda pointless, since I can have them move and eat olivi with refresh singing.

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as someone who took lyre into the tower of guidance (not an accident but favoritism) I can say without a shadow of a doubt... she is bad, her strength just isn't high enough to deal damage and she needs that SS rank to be even remotely viable due to that, unfortunately it takes an eternity to rank up weapon ranks for laguz and they have no good methods for that, but then again I never thought to give her resolve so that could make up the difference for her, her speed and luck are good so her avo is solid but I don't recall it being game breaking (even with true hit) her defense leaves a lot to be desired and laguz have very janky exp gains.

as for the full gauge galdr, it is nice because olivi grass is still a finite resource (in theory of course), and you can use it to have a laguz full and ready to crush everyone on player phase, olivi grass spam requires two turns and won't get you a player phase attack(or a same turn shift for that matter), it is also helpful for laguz types which take a long time to be ready (lions, tigers, especially dragons, I think it is about five turns assuming you are not attacked to shift, though it may be meaningless because by this point, assuming you do everything you are sitting on two laguz gems), there is also the full hp galdr which is great if you want to use it with rafiel.

I admit I really like the laguz in concept, but really thinking about it, most of them needed better growths and bases, they are not near as op as they should have been transformed maybe a *3 multiplier is in order for the remake.

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All of the Laguz are pretty decent if you can manage to get them into the level 30's except Lyre. I've gone through RD 15 times now and I can never seem to make her very viable.  Her availability is poor, and her strength negligible so she can't do any damage. Vika & Nealuchi have high dodge so they are somewhat more useful than Lyre but once again strength is an issue for them. There are simply better options than those three. Mordekai and Lethe paired works pretty well. Ranulf is all around solid and I usually throw corrosion on him to disable units. Kyza isn't too bad if you can level him enough but once again, there are better tigers. 

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In case you didn't know (and since I don't see it mentioned here yet): use Blossom on your high-level laguz (Ranulf, Janaff, Ulki, etc.). When you can spare it, give them BExp to reach 99 exp, and then when they level up in battle they should get quite good growths, at no cost since they're gaining 1 exp anyway.

Do be aware that Adept and mastery skills reduce weapon exp gain if they deprive you of your second swing. They might be worth it anyway, but no need to rush them if e.g. Janaff is wrecking everything anyway.

Spam Olivi Grass as much as you want. I did an all-laguz run once (I allowed myself to use forced beorc as well as enough units to get up to 6 deployed, but leaned on the laguz where possible) and I didn't run out, so I feel like you'd have to mismanage things badly to run out. Just make sure you buy it all when it appears.

Laguz end up with more CP than beorc units, so lategame you can pull off some nasty combos with them. Try Resolve on a high-avoid laguz and stack it with Adept and their mastery, for instance; you'll be nearly immortal with a huge proc rate.

Cat gauge isn't as bad as a lot of people act like it is. You have to use an extra grass once or maybe twice a battle (strictly speaking, it's every 15 turns + combats), which while a negative isn't the end of the world. Ranulf is really quite good IMO, and Lethe's a bit underrated too. Lyre... has potential on paper but it's hard to reach and nothing other options don't do better. Still I think I ended up liking her better than Kyza, who can't even double generals in Endgame IIRC despite being the supposed speed-focused tiger. (If not heavily invested in, mind, Lyre is worse than virtaully everyone; this shouldn't be taken as a general defence of her.)

Laguz are a bit of a mixed bag in RD for sure (some of them just don't have good enough stats to make up for the negative of being stuck at 1 range and losing a player phase periodically) but I still liked them better than their PoR equivalents who were at best just mediocre, low-utility jagen-type units which is exactly what I don't want from my jagens.

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I didn't know about skill activation taking away from strike xp gain. I forgot blossom existed as a skill lol. I've used BEXP to 0.99 before, but blossom will make that crazy. Looks like I'll be using Ulki, Janaff, Skrimir, Volug, Mordecai, Naeluchi, Lethe (maybe), and Ranulf. They're split up enough availability-wise, so I won't run into deployment issues. I'll just drop whoever is worse once they join the same cast.

Thanks for the info, everyone!

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Huh... skills lower weapon / strike level gain?

Never ever heared of it, but good to know.

 

Volug is definitely the easiest to train because of his availibility and the fact that he gets more experience for fighting Laguz.

Mordecai can get some experience too by letting him attack untransformed. In part 2 he can survive four physical hits and in part he can take three. It's a good way to give him some exp.

Ranulf can easily get strike level by double attacks. In 3-4 in hard mode he normally can't ORKO the warriors and halberdiers, so he could feed kills to Lethe, Lyre or Kyze.

The other ones Lethe, Lyre and Kyze can't do anything untransformed. When they join in part 3 they need 7-8 kills to get a level up. 

Nealuchi can barely do anything with A strike in part 4.

Edited by Jules
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1 hour ago, Hecatia Lapislazuli said:

Huh... skills lower weapon / strike level gain?

Never ever heared of it, but good to know.

 

Volug is definitely the easiest to train because of his availibility and the fact that he gets more experience for fighting Laguz.

Mordecai can get some experience too by letting him attack untransformed. In part 2 he can survive four physical hits and in part he can take three. It's a good way to give him some exp.

Ranulf can easily get strike level by double attacks. In 3-4 in hard mode he normally can't ORKO the warriors and halberdiers, so he could feed kills to Lethe, Lyre or Kyze.

The other ones Lethe, Lyre and Kyze can't do anything untransformed. When they join in part 3 they need 7-8 kills to get a level up. 

Nealuchi can barely do anything with A strike in part 4.

The plan seems to be becoming the following with regards to immediate needs;

Volug to S strike. Easy. Happens even without favoritism. Maybe throw him paragon. Do 0.99 BEXP level ups during DB chapters when possible.

 

Naeluchi to S strike. Seems like a bit of favoritism will let him get it before the end of act 2. He isn't really competing with anyone in act 2.

Mordecai tanking for xp. I generally use Brom for blocking a choke, so I can replace him with untransformed Mordecai + healing potion spam. Maybe find a way to let Lethe get some finishing blows.

Lethe needs some finishing blows from Mordecai/in general in act 2 and 3. I'm unsure if I'll end up using her. Ranulf seems better in every single way, except availability. His bases are shockingly higher than hers.

Ranulf simply gets used and weakens for Lethe/Mordecai kills. I've never used Ranulf. For anything. We'll see how it goes. I'm assuming I'll just skip Lethe and use Ranulf.

 

Janaff, Ulki, and Skrimir take my usual strats, just with more favoritism. Possibly avoid adept and tear for extra Wexp on Hawks.

Edited by Centh
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@Centh Pair Volug with Zihark. Give Volug Paragon & Zihark Beastfoe. A truly monstrous team at A rank. Their avoid is + 35 at rank A. 

@Centh Oops, avoid is +45 at rank A. What is it with Zihark/Nolan? 

 

Edited by grinus
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Muarim & Vika actually rivals the Royals. But they just have low availability.

 

2 hours ago, grinus said:

@Centh Pair Volug with Zihark. Give Volug Paragon & Zihark Beastfoe. A truly monstrous team at A rank. Their avoid is + 35 at rank A. 

^Agree

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I think I have Zihark + Nolan building right now. I'll see if I can change it. I usually build Jill + Volug because they have similar movement.

 

How would I get Maurim and Vika to have any strike rank ups? They only have like 2 chapters and I'm not into sitting untransformed at a boss for 30 turns.

 

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32 minutes ago, Truebladee said:

Muarim & Vika actually rivals the Royals. But they just have low availability.

That's quite the bold statement to make in defense of those two, especially Vika, who can't do much, if any, damage to most enemies when she returns in part 4.

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9 hours ago, Centh said:

I think I have Zihark + Nolan building right now. I'll see if I can change it. I usually build Jill + Volug because they have similar movement.

 

How would I get Maurim and Vika to have any strike rank ups? They only have like 2 chapters and I'm not into sitting untransformed at a boss for 30 turns.

 

Because of their low availability, you need to use a lot of BEXP or to 'boss-abuse'. That is the only way to make them good at the endgame. 

 

9 hours ago, Shadow Mir said:

That's quite the bold statement to make in defense of those two, especially Vika, who can't do much, if any, damage to most enemies when she returns in part 4.

Statwise, they rival the Royals. I used alot of BEXP to see if they are any good and I determined that they can be good. Unfortunately, because I really like Muarim's personality & design, we cannot use them often making them kinda 'useless' in the game

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9 hours ago, Truebladee said:

Because of their low availability, you need to use a lot of BEXP or to 'boss-abuse'. That is the only way to make them good at the endgame. 

 

Statwise, they rival the Royals. I used alot of BEXP to see if they are any good and I determined that they can be good. Unfortunately, because I really like Muarim's personality & design, we cannot use them often making them kinda 'useless' in the game

You see, that's the problem - they're too much hassle for not enough output.

BEXP doesn't really help either's case, especially Vika, who has a ton of growths close to each other, meaning it can't reliably get the stats she needs, especially Strength.

Edited by Shadow Mir
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I'm on act 4 now. Ranulf is proving to be good. I've been giving him BEXP + Blossom level ups, so he hits hard. I don't think he has S rank yet though.... Maybe? It's close if he doesn't. Probably didn't focus on it enough. He is 30 with Rend. Lethe proved to be bad. She only has a few chapters of availability over Ranulf and just can't keep up. I'm not playing super slow though. No 30+ turn maps to grind. That fort defense map for GMs would've been great for Laguz, but they weren't available for deployment...... Mordecai is doing ok. I gave Haar the act 2 speedwing, which probably should have gone to Mordecai, but I don't think he'd be doubling anything anyways. He has S rank. I wasn't able to get Naeluchi up to S rank before act 4, but he is close and I got two lucky STR level ups, so it's not so bad. Skrimir got a speedwing, halfshift, and vantage. We'll see how it goes. The Hawks are being baller, as always. Janaff has S rank and Ulki is almost there.

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Skrimir doesn't need the speedwing for 4-P.
He will double all the paladins aside of the boss.
I'd just give him adept.

If Mordecai's defense is fine, he shouldn't really worry about his speed.
I think the sages only start to double him in 4-1, 4-4 and 4-5.
He's definitely most usable in the Silver Army because of 4-3, but he could be used in the Hawk Army as well because this army fights only very few magic users. And I don't even think one single sage can double him in 4-2 except for Valtome.


I have a perfect Skrimir replacement for part 4:
XSwVJjz.jpg
Slapping resolve and adept on him for part 4.
(BTW no blossom)

Edited by Hecatia Lapislazuli
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3 hours ago, Hecatia Lapislazuli said:

Skrimir doesn't need the speedwing for 4-P.
He will double all the paladins aside of the boss.
I'd just give him adept.

If Mordecai's defense is fine, he shouldn't really worry about his speed.
I think the sages only start to double him in 4-1, 4-4 and 4-5.
He's definitely most usable in the Silver Army because of 4-3, but he could be used in the Hawk Army as well because this army fights only very few magic users. And I don't even think one single sage can double him in 4-2 except for Valtome.


I have a perfect Skrimir replacement for part 4:
XSwVJjz.jpg
Slapping resolve and adept on him for part 4.
(BTW no blossom)

 

17 hours ago, grinus said:

@Centh Skrimir really doesn't need that Speedwing or Vantage. You should allocate it to another laguz. But, giving him Wildheart is a good idea.

Oh well, wasted a speedwing :( I was thinking about putting Mordecai into the hawk army. The chapters available to the hawk army ate pretty slow. The Laguz chapter for the hawk army seems like a great place for him to level up.

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I'm at endgame now. Hawks have SS and Janaff capped STR. He does as much damage as Tibarn. Maybe slightly more? Mordecai capped DEF at lvl 31. Skrimir is doing good as always. Naeluchi has S rank but I'm not sure where he will fit in. He capped DEF, haha. Too bad it's like 26 or something. Volug capped SPD and DEF with SS rank at lvl 32. He's my laguz MVP. Doge tank lol... Slapped resolve and adept on him for ludicrous output. Maurim had some great level ups on his join chapter, so I may replace Mordy with him. We'll see. Ranulf almost has SS. He hasn't capped anything, but he's lvl 32 with high stats in everything. Rend pops off constantly :) He does have gauge issues, so he can't hold the line as well as other laguz

Edited by Centh
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I gave wrath + resolve and earth support (Fiona) to Volug which should work too. But he's only a side project. 

Kyze and Mordecai are my main drafts. 
Kyze could almost reach S+ strike in 4-1. He could ORKO everything aside of the boss and a few swordmaster reinforcements. 
Mordecai has 40 defense now and takes like no damage, if any. However he still needs a bit till S+ strike because of only single attacks. Might give adept to him in 4-4 which would allow him to ORKO most enemies.

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