Magna Carta: Tears of Blood -Battle System Guide- v1.63 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Version History & Copyright ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Version 1.01 - This is the good to go initial release from here it can only get better, I hope *swear drop*! Version 1.51 - This version has corrected some mistakes made in the guide, added a whole new section, and made more elaboration on Chi Lanterns and Status Effects! Version 1.61 - Added a few new tips to combat and added an interesting secondary opening trying to explain what the battle system is like! Version 1.63 - Updated the 'Table of Contents' and added a few notes. - Author: Phillip Woodward (BeyondSpectrality/BloodOfSin) © Copyright 2005 Phillip Woodward. All rights reserved. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ To Open I would like to say that this is my first FAQ/Guide ever, so I hope it meets your expectations and helps you out! If you see anything that is incorrect or a spelling error or just something you would like to add/ask please notify me at beyondspectrality@hotmail.com thanks! Now that we're by that all references in this are written by me and copyright to SoftMax, those who help will be credited accordingly. Okay, now on to the guide before I get flamed for such a stupid opening! --------------------- --------------------- Table of Contents --------------------- I. Section 1: Before the Battle -Dash Mode -Detect Mode -Rest Mode -Chi Lanterns -Normal Attack -Suprise Attack -First Attack II. Section 2: Battle Break-Down -Chi -Leader bar -Trinity Ring -Standard -Combo -Counter -Trinity Drive -Selected Player -Player Name -HP Bar -Shield Meter -Mode Indicator -Style Indicator -Idle Players -Battle Menu -Style -Run -Item III. Section 3: End of Battle Break-Down -Results -Record & Max Damage -Items Obtained -EXP Display -Name & Avatar -Level -EXP -GOT -Level Up IV. Section 4: Miscellaneous -General Battle Notes -Battle Movement -Switching Players in Battle -Switching Targets -Gaining New Styles -Satus Effects -The Status Effects -Poison -Paralysis -Stone -Confusion -Power Up -Defense Up -Death -Enemies V: Section 5: Special Thanks! --------------------- o-o; --------------------- You know, I already did one introduction but I figured after reading over everything there's one thing I didn't do. What's that? I never told you what the battle system was like (If you know what it's like skip this and get right down below to the technical stuff...When you look at the battle system you think, "Wow that ring reminds me of Shadow Hearts." Well I'll tell you right now it really isn't. It's more like Legend of Dragoon...but then again its not...this system really is different. It utilizes a type of turn based system with a mix of real-time. Then it adds a battle menu and something like the Destiny Ring from Shadow Hearts but it works like Legend of Dragoon (if you miss the button you don't attack sort of thing). The way you attack and do different attacks is much different from other RPGs and where you get your power from is the energies surrounding the world around you...truly an interesting system that I consider the best in RPG gaming today! Anyways...on with the guide...I hope this is a good explanation to those who wonder what the system is like... --------------------- I. Section 1: Before the Battle In this section we'll over-view ways to prepare for battle. Before anything else remember to save often and always remember to equip your best items! Try to balance your character's levels and keep their Style's up to date (for reasons you'll find later)! Always try and check the Blacksmiths for Quests, equipment, upgrade weapons, and new weapons. always check Fortune Tellers for Fortunes, Talismans and Talisman Combine...And um...well that's all the easy to remember stuff; let’s get to the more technical things! Okay!? Let's go! - Dash Mode - Dash Mode allows you to move across combat areas with good speed but you have an extremely small detect area leaves you vulnerable to getting 'Surprise Attacked' which I will explain later. This is default change it by pressing R1 or Square. - Detect Mode - Detect Mode draws your sword and makes you significantly slower than when in Dash Mode (some people think it's too slow and complain about it o-o;). While in Detect mode your area of detect is extremely larger than when in Dash Mode making it much easier to surprise enemies and find chests in this mode. To surprise an enemy you have to press X to slash at them which initiates 'First Strike' (which we'll talk about later). To sneak up on an enemy you have to get to the side or behind them, but don't get too close or they'll detect you. If you can't see them but they are in your detection area or you can't tell which way they are facing, use your map to look at their field of vision which loose something like, .< the . being them and the < being their field of vision. Toggle between Dash and Detect with R1. - Rest Mode - In Rest Mode you go into a kneeling position, you're detection radius is the same as if you were in Dash Mode and you sit in one spot while your characters gain HP. You can also access the menu while like this, but you won't gain HP for your Characters while in the menu. If you happen to be attacked in this mode it will initiate a Surprise Attack. Toggling between Rest Mode and your previous mode is done with Square. - Chi Lanterns - Chi Lanterns are expressed as white squarish blips on your map and are spread out through combat zones to effect Chi. To check what Chi it is walk up to it and press X it will tell you what type of Chi Area the Lantern is and then will bring up a Talisman menu I recommend saving and checking out all of the different effects that talismans have on the Lantern. If you don't need to change anything press Circle to cancel out. Make sure to either arrange the Lanterns to help your current party or arrange your party so that the lanterns help you. Remember whatever Chi is expressed by the lanterns there will be more of that type Chi when in combat. But not only does it change the element, whatever the previous element was it will have different effect. Sometimes you can accidentally destroy a Chi Lantern if you put an element in it that is on the opposite side of the spectrum. Like if you put Earth into a Celestial Lantern it could blow up. (Note: The Chi of a Talisman can be noted by what letter it has next to it before it says the name of the Talisman. You can note what elements these are in the Chi Section of the FAQ.) The different effects I was talking about are something like this: ___________________________ ___________________________ | Effects of Using An Earth | | Effects of Using A | | Talisman on an Earth | | Celestial Talisman on an | | Lantern | | Earth Lantern | |___________________________| |___________________________| | | | | | -Earth Chi increases. | | -Celestial Chi increases. | | | | | | -Strengthens Earth-based | | -Weakens Earth-based | | enemy powers. | | enemy powers. | | | | | | -Strengthens Earth-based | | -Earth Chi decreases. | | attack powers. | | | | | | -Strengthens Celestial | | | | based attack powers. | | | | | | | | -The Lantern explodes. | |___________________________| |___________________________| - Normal Attack - Normal attack is when you encounter an enemy and you bring up your sword to deflect the enemy's strike. Once in battle there are no special effects to the battle and your 'Leader Bar' 9we'll talk about this later) runs normally. - Surprise Attack - This happens when you're not careful and the enemy attacks you, allowing them to get usually two or more attacks before your Leader Bar even starts to fill. Your Leader bar will fill slower than usual until the 'Conditions of Battle' (we'll brush more on this later) are turned. - First Strike - This happens when you surprise the enemy by sneaking up on them and pressing X slashing the enemy and starting battle. This allows you to do two or more attacks with any character or characters before their Leader bar Starts to gain. This also effects the Leader Bar in your favor making it gain faster unless the Conditions of battle are turned. - I think that's all you really need to know about 'Before the Battle', let us move on. If you feel something should be added here contact me. --------------------- II. Section 2: Battle Break-Down In this section I will be explaining the break-down of the in-game battle system ^^; Shall we begin? - Battle Chart: _____________________________________________ |1. Chi 2. Leader Bar | | H A I W ____^________E | | M E F L P________^____ | | | | | | / + 15%[] | | 3.Trinity Ring |4. Trinity Drive | |7. Battle Menu O | | _____ / \ | | |Style| | | | | |Run | \ / | | |Item | O___X | | |_____| | | | |5. Selected Player | | ________________________ 6. Idle Players | | |Eonis Style | Azel Chris | | |_________ Strd. | _______ _______ | | |.. HP 369 1 ooo | . HP560 . HP367 | | |________________________| | |_____________________________________________| Reference: http://www.got-next.com/media_ps2/magna_carta/magna_carta2.jpg - Battle Chart Numbers: 1. Chi- From left to right, top then bottom. H:Celestial A:Air I:Ice W:Water M:Mountain E:Earth F:Fire L:Lightning Chi is the energy of your surroundings; different areas have different Chi, like a mountain area as more Mountain Chi than a low water area. This can be altered by using Chi lanterns found throughout the landscape. Changing them will aid your characters in their area of Chi, but be careful changing the lantern can also hurt your other characters in Chi and help the enemy. The power of Chi is noted by how bright its icon is, the brighter the better, not only does it mean you can use the attack longer, but it also makes the attack you use stronger or weaker depending on the power of that Chi Area. If the symbol has nothing around it, you're out of Chi and need to switch styles or characters. Chi is drained by using skills. The more powerful the skill, the more Chi the attack uses, thus skill 1 uses less Chi than skill 4. What area of Chi your character is using can be seen by pressing Triangle to open the 'Battle Menu' and selecting Style. There you can see the current style you're using and the attacks you have learned for it. Next to the name you see the letter/symbol for what area of Chi it uses. Different Characters and Styles use different areas of Chi, utilize them. The enemy also uses up Chi and attacks on the same Chi energy you do. To better serve your attack strategy it is nice to know what area of Chi your enemy is using. This can be identified by either looking at what Chi symbol is drained when the enemy attacks or by the color of the enemy's aura before it attacks. Obvious Aura colors, blue is water, red is fire, but other than that I don't know the other ones. If someone does it'd be nice to make a chart! Anyway, that concludes our portion about Chi. - 2. Leader Bar-The Leader Bar regulates how often you can attack and fills over time. The ^ (which in-game are pointing down) are what I call 'Attack Points' When the Leader Bar reaches one of these points it means you or the enemy can attack. There are two Leader Bars, the one labeled E is the enemy's and the one labeled P is yours. The leader Bar is affected by various things such as; Party Trust, Conditions of Battle, and Odds of Battle. How much your party trusts you will effect the leader bar, the more trust you have with your party members the faster the bar will gain. The less trust you have, the slower it will gain for you. Conditions of battle, like Surprise attack compared to First Attack, also affects the rate of the Leader Bar. Surprise Attack making it much slower for you and faster for the enemy, Normal is well...normal for both parties, and First Attack makes it gain faster for you, slower of the enemy. ‘Odds of Battle’ is a simple equation of your characters plus the number of enemies. If there are two characters and three enemies the leader bar will gain faster for the enemy and slower for you and vice-versa. Odds can be changed through the duration of battle however, like if one of your characters dies the bar gains even more slowly, but if you kill one of the enemy it gains faster for you. Things like these can decide the results of battle. I think this conclude the leader bar section of the guide. (Note: Trust is gained and lost by giving party members items or talking to them at Save points/Inns.) (Another Note: 'Status Effects' can affect the Leader bar as well, like if a character is paralyzed it acts the same to the Leader bar as if one of your characters died. Mind you your character doesn't actually die and the effect will wear off/can be cured. But the effect can be fairly devastating none the less.) - 3. Trinity Ring- I'm not sure how much explanation this needs, but here we go. The 'Trinity Ring' is how you activate and succeed in the execution of attacks. You activate it by pressing he designated button at the top of the ring which is either O or X. Once activated the next parts in the succession will come up to the top of where the original designated button was, from here timing is everything. Mess up and you don't get an attack boyo. But as a counter to this, you never miss...so you take your chances...I like it better this way, it takes away the random miss percentages. There are three modes of combat for the Trinity Ring: Standard - Standard combat mode is the basic set for all Styles and makes it so you use one basic attack and makes you do a succession of three button presses designated and two more. The succession of your attacks brings up your skill from 1 to 2 to 3 and so on. This Once you reach a certain skill or skill 4 you can press left or right to cycle through all of them, but you can only use those you have done in succession. Standard is default but can be changed or changed back to by pressing up or down on the d-pad (look in the bottom left at your 'Selected Player' info and look for a blue 'Strd.' icon), but not all Styles have more than just Standard. What modes a Style has can be seen by pressing Triangle and entering the Battle Menu, then select Style and you will see the attack modes for your current Style. (Note: This mode is great for basic maneuvers.) Combo - To use this you need to make sure your Style has it (again press Triangle to open the Battle Menu and choose Style to check). Once you know if it does note that you have to have the style mastered. If so, switch to it, this sets you up for your basic skill 1 Trinity Ring which once completed sends you through a constant rotation of the rest of your skills 2-4 and once finished it performs a special attack. For Calintz' Fuget Style it goes like this; change to Combo use it X, O, O - then the Ring will reform and the constant flow of skills 2-4 will begin like so O, O, O, X, O, O, O, O, O. if you do this without messing up Calintz will perform 'Air Rush', a very powerful attack combo (Note: if you mess up you will not attack at all). You also do not have a shield in this mode so you will take a lot more damage. You can change to this mode by pressing up or down on the d-pad (look in the bottom left at your 'Selected Player' info and look for a orange 'Combo' icon). (Note: This mode is generally best suited for taking out one or two enemies quickly.) Counter - This is very hard to use you have to get the enemy to attack you with this mode on and then you have to guess the enemy's attack combo in a Trinity Ring with the buttons covered by '?'. The result is just like Standard, you go through the progression of skills 1-4, the difference is you waste an enemies attack and then do your own attack. You can change to this mode by pressing up or down on the d-pad (look in the bottom left at your 'Selected Player' info and look for a purple 'Cntr.' icon). You do not have a shield in Counter Mode. (Note: This mode really isn't recommended and shouldn't be used by beginners.) Okay, now onto damage variants for the Trinity Ring...of course we know the amount of Chi you use affects how much damage you deal, but this is not the only factor. The amount of Goods and Greats you get when pressing the buttons for the Trinity Ring also affect damage. If you get three Goods the damage would be lower than if you got three Greats. Another benefit to getting three Greats is one it raises your Trinity Drive (which we'll talk about later. And it also can gain you your next skill for your current Style, in-turn eventually mastering that Style. I've noticed that it is kind of random as to how many three Greats you have to get before it gains you a new skill. But it always seems to be harder to get that first new skill of a Style. The benefits of gaining new skills is obvious.....Anyway, I think this concludes the explanation on the Trinity Ring (which turned out to be longer than the other two ;o)... - 4. Trinity Drive - The Trinity Drive is a battle aid that is sometimes a really annoying/hard thing to achieve. It goes up by 5% every time you get 3 Greats, it doesn't go up at all if you get a good, and if you miss at all the whole gauge is depleted and goes back to 0%. You can use the Trinity Drive by pressing Square once it has reached 30% or above. Using it makes one attack more powerful based on the percentage you use it at, so at 30% it does 1/3 more damage, 50% it does 1/2 more damage, and 100% it does twice the damage (just to use as some small examples. I think that's all you really need to know about trinity Drive. - 5. Selected Player-This shows the player you currently have selected and are using for combat and can be changed with R1.The 'Selected Player' box shows more information than the Idle Player boxes such as: Player Name - Displays Selected Player's name. HP Bar - Shows an HP Bar and how much HP your character has. Shield Meter - The little dots under the HP bar are the shield mere and are there in Modes like Standard. What a shield does is protect you from a certain amount of damage. For every one hit you take one dot is taken away and once these run out you will take more damage. The recharge instantly after the enemy finishes its attack. Magic goes through the shield and does full damage. (Note: As soon as the enemy's attack is over the character's Shield Meter recharges.) Mode Indicator - This shows what attack mode you are currently using and which way to press up or down to change to a different attack mode. Style Indicator - This shows what Style you're using and what part of the skill succession you are on for that Style, each time you use a successive move it will light up the next skill. If you have not mastered the Style it will only show dots for which ones you have gained. once you have gone through the necessary skill succession to light all of the dots up you can cycle through them by using left and right on the d-pad. I think that's all you need to know about the Select Player Box... - 6. Idle Players- The Idle Player Box shows minimal things such as the character's name, HP Bar and how much HP they have, and their Shield Meter. - 7. Battle Menu- The Battle Menu is opened during combat by pressing Triangle and once open you'll notice three options to open their sub-menu press X. to back out of the menu without doing anything press O. Here are the three options: Style - You can change Styles whenever you want with this option by pressing Triangle and pressing left or right on the d-pad, note that you can only change Styles when you have reached an attack point on your Leader bar. Changing Styles does not interrupt or deplete your current 1-4 skill succession on the Style you're changing from, so don't be afraid to change. This also shows you various information about the Styles you have as stated in previous sections. Run - Well kind of obvious, but this lets you run away from battle. I'm not sure if you need to reach an attack point on your Leader bar or not because I've never had to use it. Item - This allows you to use Talismans to affect the tide of battle. Once you open it, it will bring you to a menu showing all your talismans and will give you a description of each. use them to do such things as add Wind Chi or heal/resurrect a party member. Note that you have to have reached an attack point on your Leader Bar to use a Talisman. To switch the target you have for your item try pressing R2. Besides these the battle menu also pauses the battle...so with that in mind I think that will conclude the Battle Menu portion of this guide. - And with that we have concluded Section 2: Battle Break-Down. --------------------- III. Section 3: End of Battle Break-Down This hopefully won't be a long and drawn out section, but there will be some interesting information in it! Most of which you probably already know, but I thought it might be worthy of a new section! K? Let's move it out! - End of Battle Chart: _____________________________________________ |1. R e s u l t s | | ----------------------------------------- | |2. Record Calintz | | --------------- _____ | | 267 | |LV 12 | |2. Max Damage | |EXP _____^__ | | --------------- |_____|GOT _^______ | | 174 | | Eonis | | _____ | | | |LV 10 | | | |EXP ______^_ | | |_____|GOT __^_____ | |3. Items Obtained | | ----------------- Haren | | & H:Thank You 1 _____ | | % Iron Ore 1 ^| |LV 8 | | Level | |EXP _^______ | | + 108 Sid Up |_____|GOT ___^____ | | O 6366 Sid 4. EXP Display | |_____________________________________________| Reference: http://www.got-next.com/media_ps2/magna_carta/magna_carta3.jpg - End of Battle Chart Numbers: 1. Results- A display of the out come of the end battle. - 2. Record & Max Damage- These to displays go hand in hand. One is a record of your highest damage and the other is the Max Damage you made in this last battle. Why is this important? Because breaking your Max Damage Record results in a New Record. Why is this important? Because when you break your old record you get bonus experience and I believe you all know why this is important. Now there are two interesting things to learn from this. One is that you don't want to break your record with something like 223 to 567, that's no good. We want to make it something like 223 to 257, milk all of that extra experience. Now the second thing is that the exp you gain negates your level. What it shows is how much your characters exp bar goes up. So it kind of sucks for lower level characters but it's great for higher levels. Ahem, anyway let's move on. - 3. Items Obtained- Kind of simple, this shows you what items and how much Sid you gained for the battle....it also shows your total Sid. You can gain anything from Talismans to 'Gift Items' to Blacksmith Upgrade/Quest items. - 4. EXP Display- This shows the three characters you have in your active battle party with an avatar, their level, their exp (before and after, I'll explain in a minute), their 'GOT' exp, and if they leveled up. To go into more detail: Name and Avatar - Just displays the name and picture of the characters in your active battle party. Level - Shows what level your character is before and after a level up. EXP - This shows how much EXP your character has until leveling and it shows how much experience gained after adding your GOT exp, which could result in a level up. GOT - This displays the exp that you gained from your battle and is then added to your exp bar. Extra GOT is obtained by breaking your last Max Damage record but is shown on a different bar from the rest. Level Up - This icon is displayed if your character levels up from experience gained in the battle. - I think that concludes this section of the guide...remember to contact me if I need to change or add anything! --------------------- IV. Section 4: Miscellaneous This section just kind of touches on the other little things that might aid you in battle... - General Battle Notes- These could have gone elsewhere and maybe they should of, but I think that I needed to make a new section to accentuate their importance. here we go: Battle Movement - You can move freely in the battle 'arena' and go where you want. This can be used to strategically confuse enemies (i.e. get a First Strike and then go up and attack twice, once they get their leader bar run back behind a team-mate. While there the enemy will usually bring all of the foes forward allowing you to gain more of your Leader bar. This tactic has gained me 4 attacks before the enemy had 1). Note that your Leader Bar does not gain while moving, and the enemy's Leader Bar doesn't gain when they are moving. Switching Players in Battle - To switch between characters in battle use L1 or R1. Switching Targets - When you have enemies in range or are using a Talisman on a certain party member but it doesn't auto-lock on the one you want use L2 and R2 to switch between the targets. - Gaining New Styles- You gain other Styles from Style Scrolls, these are received from Trigger items you find in-game (i.e. *Minor Spoiler* The scroll you find in Reith's cave), after certain training events, and after some boss battles. These scrolls are used by going to your out of battle interface menu (press Triangle when not in a battle) and go to Items. Find the scroll you received and then use it on a usable character (as far as I've seen scrolls have designated characters they go to). Once used go to the Style portion of the menu and make sure it is equipped on the character you used the scroll on (it'll be highlighted in blue if equipped and dimmed in a dark blue if not equipped). Note that you can only have 4 different Styles equipped at one time. - Status Effects- This probably should have been in Battle Break-Down but oh well. You can give or receive status Affects by getting hit or using certain moves in battle. The status effect is either shown by your character model changing color or having a symbol appear next to them. Most status effects can be cured with Talismans. I recommend you cure your party member fast, because some of the status effects are pretty damaging and some like paralyze affect the rate of the Leader Bar. If a character is Paralyzed it will act as though your character has died (only on the leader Bar because the status effect will wear off or can be cured). (Note: Not all Sates Effects are bad.) The Status Effects: Poison - This is shown by a little green bubbling type icon and your character's model turns green. With this status effect your character will take damage in intervals. Paralysis - Displayed by a little web icon, this makes your character have the inability to move. Stone - Shown by an icon of a little stone and I believe your character model turns gray (like stone, lol, but don't quote me on that). With this ailment your character is turned to stone and is easily targeted by the enemy. Confusion - Displayed by an icon of two question marks, this Status Effect turns the commands on the Trinity Ring into question marks. Power Up - Displayed by what looks like evil eyes this makes your attack power increase by 50%. Defense Up - Shown by a little white dude flexing is muscles this raises your defense by 50% but makes you more easily targeted by the enemy. Death - When your character reaches an HP count of 0 he or she will say a really cheesy line like, 'I never thought this could happen.' and then flop over. They can be revived with certain Talismans but if your whole battle party reaches 0 the game is over! - Enemies- The enemies work off of the same system you do. They don't gain on their Leader Bar when moving and only one chosen enemy can attack. The elements they are using can be seen by the color of their aura before they attack or by what Chi symbol drains when they attack. They also use the same Chi as you so watch out to what the Chi Area they use and what Chi Area you use (yes this is kind of repeated information but oh well). - I think, unless more is added later, that will conclude this section of the guide. --------------------- V. Section 5: Special Thanks! Hhhhmmm not much to say here yet other than I hope I addressed most of your concerns and questions. A special thanks to SoftMax for developing this wonderful game and a special thanks to Atlus for releasing the game to us Americans! Oh, I finally get to add someone to my special thanks besides developers! Thank you to 'Ulala Rules' for helping me with the Copyrighting of this Guide! And um yeah, thank you for reading. If you need to get in contact with me for any reason my email address is beyondspectrality@hotmail.com and my AIM is Spectrality1928. Bye now! Hope this helped! --------------------- -Phil/BeyondSpectrality Last Updated - November 18, 2005