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The Genius of Sappheiros/Gameplay

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Revision as of 02:45, 8 October 2012 by Abomination (talk | contribs) (Added critical hit activation formula.)
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The Genius of Sappheiros is, at its core, a traditional console-style JRPG, but it comes with many intricate systems and details that might go unnoticed at first. Learning and using these is key to success. However, many things might seem familiar if you have played the SAGA series or Etrian Odyssey.

The Menu

The game's menu has ten choices. From left to right, first row then second row:

  • Status: View the statistics of a character. The A button will bring you straight to their equipment, the X button will bring you to the Power menu, and the Y button to their spell set.
  • Formation: Set a formation for your party members. After selecting a formation, you can freely switch characters around within that formation. You can recieve more Formations from NPCs like Hieda no Akyuu as the game progresses. The positioning of your characters will affect who will be targetted by area-effecting spells. Different formations can change who is targetted the most, how much damage certain characters take or deal, and so on.
  • Equipment: Set a character's equipment. Each character can wield one of four weapon types based on who they are, as well as a shield and armor. Each character is restricted in their armor/shield choices, with S-class characters only being able to equip S-type; M being able to equip M and S; L-class armor users can use anything. Finally, each character can have up to three accessories. Before a piece of equipment can be used, however, you must return to the overworld at least once.
  • Growth: Use a character's accumulated POW levels to enhance certain skill sets. Each character has 14 categories they can grow in to enhance stats, add special attacks, and increase their abilities. More on the growth screen below.
  • Options: The options in order are:
    • BGM Volume
    • SE Volume
    • Max Backup Saves: The game saves automatically. It also keeps a folder with backup saves. The folder can get pretty big if this stays at max, so you might want to reduce it.
    • Disable Keys: Options are "disable autobattle", "disable flee", and "disable both".
    • Hint: If it's on (second choice), you'll recieve gameplay tips if you lose a battle.
    • Animations: Show battle animations (yes or no)
  • Inventory: View the party's inventory. Items with Yellow text are new, and cannot be equipped until you have returned to the overworld.
  • Party: Change your current party. You can have five characters in battle, and a sixth in the "support" slot. This character will provide some stat bonuses to the rest of the party. They can also be called on during battle to use two support spellcards to assist the party as a free turn.
  • Spell Set: Change the spells a character has equipped. Each character can only have six different spells/weapon skills/spellcards equipped in total.
  • Data: View data such as battle statistics, item and formation collection lists, and the game's bestiary.
  • Pause: Puts the game in pause mode. The timer will not increase while this is selected.

Battles

Battle begins when you touch an enemy in a dungeon. The initial command list will pop up, giving you several options. Pressing A will bring up the normal character menus, while B and Y will let you get a better look at the battlefield. The L button will allow you to flee; R will set the party to auto-battle. You can also use X at this point to bring up the Support Spell menu, which will allow you to use the support spells of your sixth party member.

Each character has a set of commands comprised of their normal weapon attack and the abilities and spells set in the Spell Set menu. Each of these comes with their own requirements: almost every command other than a normal attack will consume some of the character's MP. In addition, the final value displayed in an attack's description is a cooldown timer - after casting that spell, the character will be unable to cast that spell again for that many turns (Normal attacks and some abilities have a 0, meaning they can be used whenever). Finally, Spellcards, indicated by one or two stars in the bottom-right of the icon, have a couple additional requirements: Using one spellcard will impose that cooldown timer on all of a character's spellcards, and they will consume a number of Bomb items in addition to MP, represented by stars on the icon - the green star in a character's status display is the number of bombs they currently have. If no action seems worthwhile, the Y button will tell a character to defend. Per the manual, defending does not actually increase the character's defense (it only allows characters wielding two-handed weapons to block with a shield), so it is more like a "pass" option.

Once all character actions have been inputted, all characters - both enemy and ally - will attack based on their speed. Rinse and repeat.

Randomly, when a character is attacked or attacks, the character will glow with the message Last Word Chance. This chance is greater as the character's HP decreases. These are akin to Limit Breaks or similar systems, and will appear in the character's selection. These Last Words tend to activate very early in the battle round, and provide extremely powerful effects. They also come with no MP, bomb, or cooldown costs, although once they are used or the battle ends, the Last Words will disappear from the character's action list until Last Word Chance is activated again. It should be noted that at the beginning of the game, Last Words must be used in the next round or they will be lost. As you gain levels, you can hold them for longer and longer.

There are also two types of critical hits possible in the game. Normal criticals, which are based on the skill's critical rate and the POT stat, are indicated by the screen flashing red, will deal double damage, or even more if the user's equipment/skill increases the critical damage multiplier. The Critical activation formula is (POT/2+20)+Skill's Crit%. Meanwhile, Slayer attacks are the result of using an attack or weapon which deals extra damage against a certain enemy type (the weapon's or ability's description will include [Slayer:X]); they flash green and deal additional damage depending on the weapon. If both activate together, the screen flashes yellow - expect to see huge damage numbers pop up when this happens. Elemental weaknesses (including the weapon types) stack with both Slayer and normal criticals, so a critical hit (2x) on an enemy's weakness (usually 150% damage, though this can run as high as 8x damage) with a Slayer effect (2x) will do around six times the normal damage. The actual multiplier will appear to be even higher, as the multipliers for Slayer and Critical hits are applied before any defenses. Using a weapon or ability with Slayer can allow you to (mostly) bypass high PDEF values (or MDEF, in rare cases), and you will find that high defense and buffs will be less effective against those few foes with Slayer effects.

Also, slayer effects stack with each other; a Sword with [Slayer: Dragons] using Dragon Fang Slice (also has [Slayer: Dragons]) will have the Slayer multiplier applied twice. This effect is most noticeable with Reisen, who carries slayers against enemy families and against enemies with Permanent and Variety statuses.

When a character is defeated in combat, their lives counter (the red stars) will decrease by one. When it hits 0, the character will no longer be automatically healed between battle, cannot be revived or healed during battle, and will no longer gain EXP or Power. Reaching any healing point, however, will instantly restore all characters to their maximum of number of Lives, as well as max bombs and full MP (HP is restored to maximum after every battle). When all characters are defeated, you'll lose any items obtained in the area where you were defeated.

When an enemy is defeated, they will drop Point items (EXP) and Power items (POW), and possibly one of a number of other things. Full Power items will give a small boost in statistics to the character who recieved them (It maxes out at three); a Bomb item will give the character an extra bomb up to their maximum; an Extend item (A 1-up) will increase their remaining lives by one. They can also drop items and equipment for the party.

Statuses

Manipulating the conditions of the battlefield is an important aspect to victory in The Genius of Sappheiros, and there are three different kinds of ways to do this: Status Effects, the Land Gauge, and Battlefield Effects.

Status Effects come in three varieties in this game.

  • Permanent status effects: Poisoned, Paralyzed, Petrified, and Blinded. Some of these will not be cured on their own unless a healing magic is used, although in most cases waiting for several turns will remove the permanent effect; sleep and charm, on the other hand, can be instantly removed once the affected character is attacked by the enemy. Only one status effect can be in effect at a time; if a new one affects a character, it will overwrite the old one.
  • Variety status effects: Things like Attack Up or Defense Down. There can only be a grand total of five on a single character; if a sixth is added, the first one applied will be lost.
  • Quick status effects: Such as Dazed. These conditions will automatically disappear after the turn ends. They are noted by a "!" mark.

Here's a list of status effects in Japanese and English: (Please note: all status effects are perfectly explained in the game's manual which you can get from Strawberry Bose's site)


  • 行動制限 - permanent effects that limit a character's actions (referred to as "Restrict" in-game)
    • 盲目 (Blind) - shades (physical attacks miss)
    • 沈黙 (Silence) - ... chat bubble (disable spells)
    • 混乱 (Confusion) - two circling stars (magic attacks miss)
    • Great Confusion - two circling stars (all attacks other than vanilla physical miss)
  • 行動不能 - permanent effects that completely disable a character (referred to as "Disable" in-game)
    • 麻痺 (Paralyze) - lightning bolt
    • 石化 (Petrification) - stone. Does not wear off on its own (except with abilities that state "Permanent effects wear off faster")
    • 睡眠 (Sleep) - zzz
  • 精神操作 - permanent effects that take over a character's control (referred to as "Mind Control" in-game)
    • 狂戦士 (Berserk) - spider-like figure with 3 dots (PATK up, PDEF and EVA down, character will only use physical attacks)
    • 魅了 (Charm) - heart (attacks your own team)
    • 支配 (Control) - Symbol that resembles Byakuren's spell (Takes full control of that character)
  • Others
    • 毒 (Poison) - 3 green bubbles. Comes in several levels of increasing potency
    • 呪い (Curse) - skull in some swirls (takes damage when dealing damage, or when healing)
    • 即死 (Death) - big skull (Instakill)

Here are a few Quick effects:

  • 灼熱 (Burn) - Fire resistance decreased, may cancel actions
  • 凍結 (Freeze) - WILL cancel actions for the round, disables evasion (but not Perfect Dodge, etc.)
  • 転倒 (Daze) - WILL cancel actions for the round
  • 感電 (Shock) - usually cancels actions for the round, decreases Electrical resistance
  • 反射 (Reflect)
  • Cover - Covering ally will take all blows in place of the covered character
  • Resisted - Character remains alive with 1HP instead of dying from the otherwise-fatal blow (effect of Reraise or Mokou's commander ability)
  • Dispel - Variety effects are removed.

When a status effect is removed on its own, a bluish green speech bubble will pop up above the character.

The Land Gauge is a system in battle which can strengthen and weaken elements. Each of the main elements comes in a standard pair (Fire and Water; Wind and Earth; Light and Dark). This gauge, displayed in the top right corner in the first menu of a battle, displays which elements will be strengthened or weakened. When the gauge leans towards an element, it is strengthened and its opposite is weakened. There are three levels for each element, as well as neutral: Slight Up (minor damage increase?), Life Up (significant damage increase/decrease, regen effects occur), and Extreme Up (massive damage increase - at least 2x - and regen effects are increased). The increase can be very drastic, and some abilities can modify the Land, so take advantage of them whenever possible. In addition, some spells require certain properties from the Land gauge. As the gauge goes up, some characters and enemies may begin to recover HP at the beginning of each round. This is listed under "Land" in the Bestiary

Finally, Battlefield Effects are status effects that will affect everything, friend and foe, equally. Only one battlefield effect can be in place at a time, and using a new one will overwrite the old one.

Enemy Types

As discussed above, some attacks carry "slayer" attributes that deal double damage (or more) against certain types of enemies. There are sixteen families of enemies, each of which is represented by a symbol in the enemy's target window.

Dragon - a dragon head
Foreign God - a black cloud with an odd smile on it
Spirit/Ghost - a pale green flame
Giant - a somewhat squashed head
Transcendent - a ram's head
Magician - a witch's hat atop a pair of eyes and a scarf
Warrior - a helmet with two eyes peeking out
Tsukumogami - a treasure chest with two eyes peeking out (a mimic, basically)
Bird - an eagle's head
Beast - a lion's head
Reptile - a lizard's head
Undead - a skull
Insect - a bug head, similar to a preying mantis
Youkai - a white ghost
Aquatic/Aquans - a blob of water
Plant - a flower

Not all enemies belong to a family.

Stats

Fundamental Stats (items which increase battle stats are amplified by these stats):

  • STR (Strength, increases physical attack)
  • DEX (Dexterity, increases induction and accuracy)
  • INT (Intelligence, increases magic attack)
  • VIT (Vitality, increases physical defense)
  • AGI (Agility, increases speed and evasion)
  • POT (Potential, increases resistance)

Battle Stats:

  • 物理攻撃 (PATK)
  • 物理防御 (PDEF)
  • 魔法攻撃 (MATK)
  • 魔法防御 (MDEF)
  • 命中 (Accuracy)
  • 回避 (Evasion)
  • 誘発 (Induction, increase chance to land status, strength of all status (positive or negative), duration of any skill with duration (status or field spells))
  • 抵抗 (Resistance, resists statuses, reduces negative status duration)
  • 速度 (Speed, influences turn order)

Elements:

  • 火 (Fire)
  • 水 (Water)
  • 地 (Earth)
  • 雷 (Lightning/Electric)
  • 光 (Light)
  • 闇 (Dark)
  • 魔 (Mystic/Magic)
  • 斬 (Slash: Swords)
  • 突 (Pierce: Spears)
  • 殴 (Crush/Blunt)

Strengths and Weaknesses: On your status/equip screens and in the bestiary, you will find various symbols to indicate the degree of resistance/vulnerability to various attacks:

  • ★ : (filled star) Full Immunity
  • ☆ : (hollow star) 12.5% damage
  • ◎ : (double circle) 25% damage
  • ● : (Filled circle) 50% damage
  • ◯ : (open circle) 75% damage
  • - : (dash) normal damage
  • △ : (open triangle) 150% damage
  • ▲ : (filled triangle) 200% damage
  • ╳ : (X) 400% damage
  • ☠ : (skull) 800% damage

These damage multipliers/reductions are applied before DEF/MDEF is applied, meaning that resistances actually drop damage by more than the stated amounts, and weaknesses do extra damage. Hitting a weakness can often help you get around high DEF/MDEF values.
These symbols also apply for various status effects. Thus, an accessory with [◎ Mind Control] prevents Berserk/Charm/Control 75% of the time, before RES is applied.

For most situations between 50% and 200%, the bonuses from equipment, innate resistances/weakness, and Growth screen abilities behave as you might expect; two pieces of equipment with [● WTR] will yield [◎ WTR], and a piece of equipment with [◯ ETH] will negate Aya's △ in Earth. However, at the extremes, things may not add up as you expect, as [◎ LGT] and [● LGT] don't yield [☆ LGT], and there appears to be no way to go from ☆ in an element to total immunity. (Actually, there's virtually no way to get full immunity: a few weapons give it, but that's all)


Hidden stats:

  • 緊急回避: Perfect Dodge. A fixed percentage change of dodging all attacks unless the attack ignores perfect dodge.
  • 障壁: Enclosing Barrier. Has two kinds: physical and magical (so this is actually two separate stats). Has the same effect as perfect dodge but is specific towards physical and magical attacks. However, it is not the same as perfect dodge so things which ignore perfect dodge will not necessarily ignore enclosing barriers.
  • 結界: Barrier. Has two kinds: physical and magical (so this is actually two separate stats). A fixed percentage (X/100) constant reduction of physical and magical damage respectively unless the attack ignores physical or magical barrier. 退魔 (exorcism) has no effect.
  • 神霊結界: Divine Barrier. X/100 constant reduction of damage from all attacks. When an attack has 退魔 (exorcism), it ignores Divine Barrier by a percent (for example, an attack with Exorcism: 50 makes it only half-affected by Divine Barrier). Since it is different from physical and magical barrier, attacks which ignore physical or magical barrier will not ignore Divine Barrier. If Physical/Magical Barrier and Divine Barrier are present at the same time, the effects are compounded (for example, Divine Barrier: 50 and Magical Barrier: 50 will reduce all magical attacks to 25%).
  • Deflect/Strikeback: A set chance to completely negate any incoming physical attack. Deflect merely stops the attack, while Strikeback also give the character a free basic physical attack. If both are present (Youmu), each one is checked separately
  • Physical Counter: Chance to respond to any physical attack with a basic physical. Checked separately from Deflect and Strikeback.
  • Magic Reflection: A set chance to reflect any incoming magic attack back at the caster.

Perfect Dodge/Enclosing Barrier display a green "Miss" indicator when they activate (a "normal" miss is white)

(More to come in the future, promise)

The Growth Screen and Power

The growth screen is the heart of the game system, allowing you to customize your characters to meet different situations. It is here that you will dictate - to a degree - the role and abilities that the character will have in battle.

Each character has 14 categories that you can place power points into: Four are character-specific and relate to her individual capabilities and will increase stats, enhance certain spells, reduce cooldowns, or provide other effects. Four are for the weapon types that the character can equip (one character-specific and three generics per character), and only provide their bonuses and special moves if the character is equipped with that weapon. The last six directly increase the main stats for that character, and have a different cost per level. You are free to come into the Growth Screen at any time and move points around.

It must be noted that, with one exception (the +4 Bombs from Youmu's 25-point Devaloka ability), higher-level abilities in a tree replace identical lower-level ones. The effects are never cumulative! Therefore, filling Aya's "Reporting" tree only gives four extra bombs (rather than nine), and filling Marisa's "Magic" tree gives MATK+30 and MP+25% (rather than MATK+50 and MP+45%), in addition to other benefits from abilities in the tree. However, if another tree boosts the same stat (this often happens with weapon trees), both bonuses will apply. Also, there is a difference between "Spellcard cooldowns", "Magic cooldowns", and "Non-spellcard cooldowns", and if the same tree (Ex: Aya's Reporting tree) has two different types of cooldowns, both will apply.

When assigning Power to trees, you must drop enough into the tree to reach the next level: going from a level 10 bonus to a level 13 bonus requires three free POW levels.

The Y button will reduce the selected tree to the next level down, therefore placing those points back in your pool for use elsewhere. Select will remove ALL points from all trees and place them in your POW pool, allowing you to start from scratch. If you hit Select by accident, just hit B to exit the screen; the trees will be reset to their former positions. Just be aware that, upon leaving the growth screen, the character's MP, Lives, and Bombs will automatically adjust to reflect her new situation, and they will not automatically recover if you increased the maximums.

You earn PEx by defeating enemies, the same way as EXP (although PEx gain is not decreased by overlevelling, making the first couple of stages the fastest places to go for some late-game power grinding). Characters in the Outfield will gain PEx at one-half the rate of the active party. Bosses usually drop a lot of PEx, but any PEx beyond what is needed for the next level will be lost. Once a character reaches PLv 24, each successive level will require 5 more PEx than the last (105, 110, 115...). Once a character reaches PLv 50, the increase jumps to 10 per level (240, 250, 260...). Finally, after PLv 77 (which requires 500 PEx), each further level requires 999 PEx to reach. As a result, it is unlikely that you will get much beyond PLv 70 or so in the main game, and 80-85 in Lingering Summer Heat, unless you spend some time farming. Although you can get something useful out of up to 185 PLv in theory (4x25 for the character specific trees, 25 for the equipped weapon, and 6x10 for the stats), the maximum PLv is 99, so you'll never be able to max out all 4 character trees, nor 3 trees and your weapon. Fortunately, you'll rarely need over 99 levels because different trees are useful for different kinds of battles or strategies. Keep this level cap in mind when farming for PLv or materials, or you can easily hit the 99 limit well before even completing the main game. Considering the drop rates, you will probably reach it before you even see certain materials dropped from monsters, ever.

Formations

There are some formations the player can utilize. Some of the formations and their effects are described below. Please note: the below list is incomplete. There is another separate for party formations that is complete.

Formations with 1 party member

  • Free fight: No effect.

Formations with 2 party members

  • Free fight: Increase in speed for all members.
  • Moriya Defenser: Front row plays defense. Back row has no effects.

Formations with 3 party members

  • Free fight: Increase in speed for all members.
  • Momiji Strike: Front row gets increase in attack and defense. Back row gets increase in speed.

Formations with 4 party members

  • Free fight: Increase in speed for all members.
  • 4 way boundary: Front row gets increase in attack. Back row gets increase in defense and speed.
  • Trickster: Front row gets increase in attack and defense. Middle row gets increase in attack. Back row gets increase in magic.

Formations with 5 party members

  • Free fight: Increase in speed for all members.
  • Hakurei type: Front row gets increase in attack. Middle row plays defense. Back row gets increase in magic.
  • Master star: Front row gets increase in defense and decrease in attack. Middle and Back row gets increase in magic and decrease in speed.
  • Moriya Wall: Front and middle row gets incrase in defense. Back row has no effects.
  • Gensokyo legend of fastest speed: All members get increase in speed and decrease in defense.
  • Magician Alliance: All members get increase in magic.
  • Phoenix Sky Dance: Front row gets increase in attack and decrease in defense; middle row plays defense, gets increase in defense and decrease in speed; back row gets increase in magic and decrease in defense.