@Metabble_King How long did it take to beat the game for you?

I also love how no matter what strategy you throw at this game it continues to change it up so you need to learn and adapt or you will get frustrated and quite.

Raising low-level characters in a total pain...

As an NPC says near that point in the game, the Foodapult Mk. II with fish can be used to distract them and circumnavigate them altogether. If you do want to fight them, at least launch some fish behind them and get a free preemptive turn. I didn't have an Arcanist yet, so on my free turn I think I just Blinded it with Sand Throw, used max Power Break and max Strike Guard. I'm also pretty sure they are weak to Ice, so a few Ice Coffins should work well. Given that they give you Arcanists in the land before, it's probably a good idea to swap someone out for one.

It took me about 60 hours. I tried to build a well rounded team. I mostly used one team all the way through, although I retired a few characters to reverse their Main/Subclasses or move up to an unlocked class. Here's my end game team. It took me only a few minutes to kill the final boss, although I was a few levels higher than I should've been.

Front Row
Bushi -> Nightseeker – Maxed Blade Flurry and Follow Trace from Nightseeker. He equips a Katana and a Mace to attack twice and restore 250 HP and 24 TP with every normal attack. I maxed Aggression (higher attack with two weapons) and Attack Boost (higher physical damage) first, then stuck a few points in Blood Surge (converts HP and TP in Attack mid-battle). Later I maxed Surge Mastery, boosting his attack further at low TP and Ice Slash/Fire Strike/Flash Slash/Multislash for attacking options. He enters Blood Surge, then alternates skills and attacks to keep his HP high and his TP low for the attack boost from Surge Mastery.

Nightseeker -> Arcanist – Maxed Effect Boost and the TP regain skill from Arcanist to increase status infliction rates and recover TP with every status inflicted. He has mastered Sand Throw, Nerve Throw and Venom Throw for Blind, Paralyze and Poison status inflicting capabilities. Once an enemy is inflicted, he deals three times damage due to Status Mastery and master level proficiency. He can deal thousands of points of damage using max Shadow Bite or inflict instant death using max Assassinate. I've seriously double assassinated two FOEs before. If I give him a status weapon as his second equip, he'll constantly refill his TP with normal attacks, which is nice.

Back Row
Runemaster -> Imperial – Maxed Converter and Finisher from Imperial to regain 5 TP with every weakness struck and every enemy killed. Runic Gleam, Runic Flare, Rune Master, Runic Guidance, Element Boost from Imperial, and master proficiency grants her very high boosters all the time. She has 3/6 in all elemental runes to alter resistances on both sides of the battle. On the offensive side, she has Galvanic, Inferno and Glacier Runes maxed. She deals anywhere between 1500 damage a turn to 4000 damage a turn depending on bursts, enemy debuffs, etc.

Arcanist -> Medic – On the Arcanist side she's maxed all binding circles, Effect Boost, the TP regain skill, proficiency and Circle Boon for full party regen. On the Medic side, she has Party Heal, Heal Mastery and Refresh mastered with one point each in Treat, Recover and Revive. On her free turns she can use maxed Charm or Atrophic eye to decrease enemy attack or defense, both physical and elemental, by 30% for 3 turns. I also equipped her with Commander Boots, which allows her to use the Dancer skill Quick Step to force one of my allies to move first in a round. She's essentially the best support unit I could ask for. With ten points in Effect Boost, a weapon with six status effect or bind symbols triggers a lot when she attacks, replenishing her TP by 12 per infliction.

Either Row
Fortress -> Landsknecht – Maxed pretty much all useful skills on the Fortress side that aren't offensive. On the Landsknecht side, she's mastered Power/Mind Break, Iron Wall and Sword Breaker. Between the Fortress's Guard Mastery and the Landsknecht's Sword Breaker, she takes very little damage. I usually just use Rampart and Party Shield to soak up the damage. With good food and equipment her HP can reach 900.

It's not to bad. Like I said the other day just save the experience you get from completing quests for the members on the bench. That way they level up and you don't have to use them till you need them the most.

@Metabble_King — Thanks for the info. Cool avatar/name by the way.

I don't like avoiding enemies I can kill, if possible. I've been getting free turns on all of them, and when I can bind their heads on the first shot, the fights are pretty quick. I've actually completely neglected ice magic, though, opting instead for veteran ice and fire spells with my Runemaster.

Smart. I think I'll follow your lead and save the exp. from my completed quests for the new team of adventures I'll be raising soon.

The easiest way to level low characters is by fighting rare foes using a party of half weak, half strong characters. If you feed the right food to enemies, they turn shiny and give you 5 times the EXP. Add Holy Gift burst and EXP ^^/^^^ food for 9 to 11 times the EXP. Doing this with an Icy Pincer after feeding him a Happiness Hare nets you 150,000 EXP or more.

You're welcome. Also, thank you. Dragon Quest, where the name and avatar find their origins, is one of my favorite series; I'm kind of an RPG nut.

@Metabble_King — Haha, me too.

Shinies are mad hard, though...

I wasn't aware the Happiness Hare turns enemies shiny. Thank you, that's good information! Does it work with any of the FOEs that'll eat the food?

FOEs turn shiny when they eat their own favourite food, which changes from species to species. For Icy Pincers, it's the Happiness Hare. For the Death Mantis it's the Dragon Carp, etcetera. I used the Icy Pincer as an example because it has the best EXP to time spent ratio.

Shinies move faster and I think they slowly gain power as they shine during battle, but they aren't that much more difficult than regular FOEs. If farming Icy Pincers is to hard, it's usually pretty easy to farm Dreameaters from the second area the same way. I think their favorite food is the poisonous mushroom you get from gathering at golden plant patches. You should be able to down them in a few turns, especially if you bind their heads. They give around 70,000 EXP per kill.

Also, IIRC, both Dreameaters and Icy Pincers respawn faster than other FOEs. I think their cycle is 3 days while most other FOEs take a week to two weeks.

If you only need to level up a few characters, you can fill up the rest of your party with characters from QR codes to make it faster. Guest characters don't level up, so they are ignored when the EXP is split up, resulting in more EXP for each of your normal party members.

Random question time! What did you name your party members? I went the Fire Emblem route and used Lissa, Lucina, Eirika, Lute, and Caeda.

I just named them random normal girl names, except my sniper, who I named Accura, which I think I made up.

I named them mostly random names.

My current team is Abgar (NightSeeker-my name), Garnet (Landsknecht- FFIX character), Doctor (Medic-Doctor Who) , Cecilia (Fortress-FFIV's main character), Bella (Arcanist-poisonous plant, couldn't fit the full name).

I also have a Rune Master named Helga and a Dancer named Gerudo.

I have Ramza the Bushi from FFT, Sephiroth the Nightseeker from FFVII and Celes the Fortress from FFVI. The other two got generic names.

SPOILERS.

After mapping out most of the first floor of the Hall of Darkness, I decided I was ready to slay the elemental dragons. I've killed all three, raising my level cap to level 99, using Formaldehyde each time to get both drops. I killed the fire dragon several times and have about half the Fire Fangs I need to max out the forge slots on his rapier. It turns out the Horrid Breath from Nightmare's can be used to make infinite Formaldehyde, at only 500en a pop. I got all the conditional drops from the bosses, including the quest ones, by whittling their health down to KO range and then using a Formaldehyde before slaying them. It says it only works if the monster is killed the turn it is used, so I usually have my Arcanist use Quick Step on whoever is going to use it so that I don't kill the monster before it takes effect. A level 99 retired at level 99 has 116 skill points, which is enough for many classes to max out pretty much everything with synergy. My Runemaster -> Imperial has every single damage boost maxed along with the highest level magic for all elements. My Fortress is starting to lose usefulness now that my damage output is higher, but she'll probably gain her use again once I move further into the 6th stratum.

Random Japanese girl names.

Mine are also just random names. However on Etrian Odyssey 3 I used forum peoples names that were playing it at the time! The end game sounds so fun it might be what makes me actually finish this version this go around. I'm really liking this game and can't seem to put it down. I just wish I had more gaming time then I do as 1-3 hours a day is max for me.

My party consists of family/pet names.

Dang...once you get to the second floor of the first cave in the Scarlet Pillars the challenge REALLY ramps up!

Well sir you finally caught up to me. I've been trying to take them sheep like enemies out. They give good drops.