about to fight luca blight...

[Sasarai10]

It's not difficult. Simply use a fire mage in Flik and Viktor's party (Camus and Rina respectively,are the best options) in order to take off the White-Wolf soldiers,and in Riou's party,use a lightning mage (Luc is the best option),and some Unite attacks that cause multiple damage to one foe,like Riou+Nanami,Sid+Chaco,or Valeria+Anita,if you chose her instead of Kasumi...otherwise use Kasumi+Mondo Unite attack

[ninjaluc79]

@Punkaiser Nice ingenuity using the beasts and Viki together. Though Badeaux could be better since he's basically a walking semi-Fury Rune for the beasts and he can equip Fire-resistant equipment unlike Viki, not only Badeaux's magic sucks, that would leave Riou on healing duty.

But still, nice idea to use the beasts. Should both of them got Berserk on the same turn, Luca is finished in at least 2 turns!

[Punkaiser]

The only reason I use Viki is because I need someone to cast kindness rain every turn to cure unbalance+healing purpose. So criteria required for that character should be : high magic + low speed, if you look over the stats board of available characters at that point, only Viki fits the deal. And if i equipped unbalance runes for the beasts, that would reduce their attacks significantly.

I thought about using Badeaux and to dampen his speed so he can do Viki's job, but impossible because he's one of characters who can't equip flowing runes. Even if he was able to equip the rune, there'd be a conflict: if his speed is high enough to use howling rune before the beasts, then he would use Kindness before their turns as well which'd be meaningless. And that would be a big waste if his howling rune comes later than the beasts turn. In the end it's really better to let Riou buff them up, not Badeaux

Actually,both level 41 Sigfried and Feather can deal max ~2150 damage per turn by performing their unite with doublestrike/fury buff so even Riou critical hit or whatever he does won't be able to finish 6.5k Hp Luca by the end of turn 2. I think the only legal way to do that, is to use leveling trick to get Sigfried to level 8x so he can equip violence in his 3rd slot, then beasts unite with Sigfried in violent state at that moment could very possibly deal 4k+ damage to Luca.

[ninjaluc79]

If you think about it, yeah. There's no way at that point to make Riou's speed lower than the beasts without sacrificing a rune slot for it since he's one of the fastest characters in the game (06 SPD). So only Viki fits the job of healing unbalanced beasts. I thought Meg could do the same, but she's a bit faster than Viki, so there's a chance that Meg's turn would go first before the beasts.

[Punkaiser]

You can very well control Meg speed by leaving her at a reasonable low level as ~30 before the fight, just make sure she has about 60+ MGC in order to have 2 kindness rain spells. But i'm not sure if her HP could be enough to survive 2x vertical flame thrust or not, but whatever, S Jizo is always available for her.

[ninjaluc79]

Of course, it's much safer to place Meg on either side at the back where Luca doesn't attack with his vertical flame slash.

X X X
O X O

The X's are where Luca always attacks with his flame sword. The O's are safe spots. Meg can sit tight in there. The formation would be as thus:

Riou Feather Siegfried
Meg ------- --------

However, as you could see, one of the beasts are the most vulnerable to his fire attacks under this setup. This is where Guardian Earth and Silent Lake come in handy. Just make sure Silent Lake is cast after everybody at the front got buffed with Revenge Earth and berserked. That way, though, Meg can't heal with her Kindness Rain spell. But who needs that if the front lines just counter Luca's attacks as long as Silent Lake is in effect?

[ChikouStar]

Just wanted to post my setup since this board is kinda inactive:

All characters are level 36-40 with weapons around level 9 and best armor available. I won all fights without anyone dying, although not in any record or anything like that. Also note, I missed Futch and Humphrey ;___;

First Team:

Front Row:
Left - Flik - Lightning
Center - Oulan - Gale, Angry Dragon
Right - Hix - nothing

Back Row:
Left - Rina - Wind, Fire
Center - Nanami - Water
Right - Tengaar - Wind

Here, Flik just spams high-level Lightning, Oulan attacks, Rina uses offensive magic, Nanami heals, and Hix and Tengaar alter between uniting and attack/heal. In case things get rough, Rina can also heal with Healing Wind.

Second Team:

Front Row:
Left - Anita - Falcon
Center - Viktor - Fire Sealing
Right - Valeria - Falcon

Back Row:
Left - Luc - Wind, Water, Resurrection
Center - Chaco - nothing
Right - Sid - Earth

I stuck the Fire Sealing on Viktor because he was severely underleveled here (I couldn't put him in my party to train for some weird reason). Anita and Valeria unite, Luc is on healing duty every turn, Sid increases Viktor's defense then unites with Chaco every turn afterwards. Risky since there's only one healer (Luc) but I had enough casts of Kindness Rain, Scream, Healing Wind, etc. to carry the party the entire fight.

Last Party:

First Row:
Left - Shiro - Hazy
Center - Miklotov - Knight
Right - Camus - Rage

Back Row:
Left - Kinnison - Water
Center - Raio - Bright Shield, Earth
Right - Clive - Killer

Kinnison heals when it's needed, else he just unites with Shiro. Camus uses high level Fire magic before uniting with Miklotov. Clive just attacks. Raio heals and supports.

[veeshadow]

FYI, if Ridley is not saved on Radat (captured) there is a chance Flik and/or Viktor can't be added to party before Luca's battle. I don't know what the cause but that's what happenning when I test both scenario (Ridley saved and Ridley captured)

[KFCrispy]

i think they are not available because they are waiting in the War Room, but it's usually possible to trigger the talk scene, decline to proceed with the story battle, and then most of the characters that were involved in the scene become available to add into the party.

[ChikouStar]

i think they are not available because they are waiting in the War Room, but it's usually possible to trigger the talk scene, decline to proceed with the story battle, and then most of the characters that were involved in the scene become available to add into the party.

I actually did that multiple times, but was still unable to place Viktor in my party. Strangely enough, I could place Flik just just fine. I did not, however, save Ridley in the war scene, so maybe that does have something to do with it.

[ninjaluc79]

The best way to get Viktor to a reasonable level against Luca Blight is to use him for either the Matilda or Toran Arcs. Either can get you to reasonable levels, but the mobs at Mt. Rakutei are higher-leveled than those on the mountain road to Gregminster.

I recommend using Viktor as early as the Matilda arc so that things will get easier by the time you get to the Toran Arc as you would really need all the physical help you can get off him during that part of the game.

There are up to four fixed characters here: Hero, Freed, Nanami, and Sheena (whom you could place in the convoy) Freed is quite the mediocre character, his only saving grace having high LUCK, which means higher criticals. Nanami is basically a weaker but faster version ofo Riou. Sheena is rather high-leveled at this time, but it's much better not to use him if you plan to use more characters here.

[ChikouStar]

The best way to get Viktor to a reasonable level against Luca Blight is to use him for either the Matilda or Toran Arcs. Either can get you to reasonable levels, but the mobs at Mt. Rakutei are higher-leveled than those on the mountain road to Gregminster.

I recommend using Viktor as early as the Matilda arc so that things will get easier by the time you get to the Toran Arc as you would really need all the physical help you can get off him during that part of the game.

There are up to four fixed characters here: Hero, Freed, Nanami, and Sheena (whom you could place in the convoy) Freed is quite the mediocre character, his only saving grace having high LUCK, which means higher criticals. Nanami is basically a weaker but faster version ofo Riou. Sheena is rather high-leveled at this time, but it's much better not to use him if you plan to use more characters here.

If I remember well, I used Yoshino and the Wingers (without Nanami) for the Toran Arc, and Shin, Wakaba, Clive, Luc, and Rina for the Matilda Arc. My mindset when playing was to rotate around my characters as much as possible, because I find the sheer amount of characters one of the funnest thing about Suikoden. As I was doing this, I failed to put Viktor in my party after the first Neclord Arc, resulting in him fighting Luca at Level 26. ;__;

[ninjaluc79]

Ah, I forgot that Nanami isn't forced on the party during the Toran Arc. I probably used her so often. Yeah, I know, she's kinda annoying, but she's Riou's sister, and she only cares about his well-being. Like I said, pretty much her only saving grace is her speed, in a game where SPD decides turn order, thus making her a very good Spark rune bearer, which means everyone in the party (including slowpokes like Bolgan) will attack first before the enemies.

[veeshadow]

Actually if Viktor is only one person that underleveled, it's not big deal. I just continue my Clive's perfect game playlist (that uploaded on YT periodically), and my last progress is on Luca battles. Viktor still lv 23 but can still deal damage to Luca by Darkness Rune plus give him fire emblem and hope Luca always use fire sword to make joke damage. You can still set Viktor's equipment on castle shops (Alex, Hans, and Jeane). As long your other 5 people on his party are on great condition, you can pretty much ignore him even if he's dead. You also won't get exp anyway...

Also, I can add Flik and Viktor whenever Ridley is saved on Radat war. At least I can confirm this..