It’s been a while since we went over 7th Dragon III Code: VFD’s first four classes. Here’s a refresher. When the game begins, you only have access to the Agent, Duelist, God-Hand, and Samurai classes. Each one has something of a dual nature, meaning there’s a lot more diversity than you’d initially expect. As you make your way through the Nintendo 3DS game, the additional four classes unlock. While it would have been great to have all of these additional options available at once, they give you a round of supportive classes, then incredibly powerful ones.
I’m going to go ahead and start with the Fortuner, because it’s one of my absolute favorite 7th Dragon III Code: VFD classes. This guy or gal is going to be casting all kinds of status effects on the enemy, while simultaneously buffing your allies. The Fortuner also has some of the best automatic skills in the game. Investing in Grace of the Sun, Grace of the Moon, and Grace of the Stars is essential. Grace of the Sun has a chance of automatically restoring a portion of the entire party’s mana at the end of a turn, with more restored depending on how many points you’ve put into the skill. Grace of the Moon may automatically cure the entire party’s ailments. Grace of the Stars will give you 1.5 SP if you win in two turns after it triggers. All three are great and kick in fairly regularly.
What you want to do first with a Fortuner is max out the skills that will help your party. This means the two regenerative skills, Forest Poetry and Moonlight Poetry. The former heals a certain amount of health for a set number of turns, while the latter does the same with mana. Mana Float reduces everyone’s mana cost to zero for one turn. Dynamic Negate and Magic Negate reduce the amount of physical or magical damage dealt each turn. Personally, I recommend casting Dynamic Negate at the start of a major fight, since it lasts 3 turns. Then, cast Forest Poetry, which lasts five turns when maxed. Moonlight Poetry is a good choice for the third move, or Magic Negate if the enemy uses magic. Keep repeating so the defensive buffs remain, only occasionally swapping in Revelation skill that’ll deal damage and possibly inflict an ailment on an enemy when all buffs are in place.
The Revelation skills are really a bonus for Fortuners. They’re there for when you aren’t buffing and, given the nature of these skills, I recommend only maxing out two of them. Here’s why. Each of the Revelation skills inflicts damage and has a chance of infecting an enemy with a specific effect. The odds of that status being conferred increases the higher its level. Personally, I maxed out Revelation: Bleed, which has a chance of causing bleed, and Revelation: Poison, which could poison an enemy. Each has a chance of dealing damage each turn and means you could teach the Fortuner Oracle of Power, which drains any enemy with the bleed, burn, freeze, or poison status effect. Since there are so many skills and skill points can be tedious to earn, you want to be economical.
The other supportive class is the Rune Knight. Please, bear with me with this one. Rune Knights are my least favorite class in the game. It’s a class designed to protect allies, while also enchanting weapons and dealing major damage if you’re willing to take risks. It’s basically a combination of a Dark Knight and Paladin. (Bonus points if you name your Rune Knight Cecil!)
With a Rune Knight, you’ll want to start by maxing out the skills that will keep your allies alive. That means the Knight’s Grace that restores all allies’ health and Knight’s Gaze that cures varying degrees of ailments from all allies depending on its level. The magic defense boosting Aura Shield is also handy. If you’re going for a paladin build, make sure Life Oath, which boosts health for one battle and Clench, which lets you survive one fatal blow, are learned. Provoke increases enmity, to try and get enemies to target the character only. Substitute is most important, as it increases the Rune Knight’s defenses temporarily, while also blocking single-target attacks launched at party members.
Even though I’m not using my Rune Knight to the best of his abilities, I can’t recommend using one as a major damage dealer enough. Knight’s Pride is great, as it’ll have the character counter attack when he falls in battle. Vengeful Sword is amazing for when health is low, as the weaker the character is, the higher the damage. Plus, it can inflict bleed! Brave Sword cuts your life by half, dealing varying amounts of magical damage based on how much life you’ve lost when using the skill. However, Berserk is best. It lasts for three turns and increases magical attack and speed, while also sending the Rune Knight into a frenzy. The character will recklessly attack all enemies during the period, totally out of your control.
The Banisher is the guy or gal you bring in for fighting dragons. (It was known as the Vanisher in Japan, as you can see from the art above.) Really, that’s all I ever use mine for. See, they’re just so good at it. Some of their skills specifically state they’re effective versus dragons. Though, they’re amazing for crowd control too, as many of their skills hit every enemy on the field and even inflict burn damage.
But first, lets talk about Banishers banishing dragons. You want them using bombs whenever possible, which means maxing out Bomb Bonus so the character can have up to seven bombs stocked. Auto-Reload, which may automatically reload bombs, and Reload, which lets you spend a turn reloading a certain number of bombs, are also essential. Since some of the best attacks use multiple bombs, you need these skills. There’s no debating that.
Now, let’s talk carnage. First, the character needs Comet Spear. It’s a jumping attack with random damage that’s effective against dragons. Then give the Banisher Exterminate. It’s an automatic skill that may cause three times fire damage against all enemies when a battle begins. Follow that up with Dragon Buster, an attack that hits all enemies and is also strong against dragons. From there, War Cry, an automatic skill that may raise the Banisher’s attack and defense for three turns when battle begins is handy. Round that out with either Clap Trap or Carpet Bomb, two bomb-based attacks that both hit all enemies and have a chance of burning them, and you’ll be set. Though, the high damage Assault Spear is good if you want to deal major damage to a single foe.
Finally, there’s the Mage. For me, the Mage is a huge disappointment. This character has some amazing elemental spells that deal extraordinary levels of damage to foes, combined with three of the best healing spells in the game. Except, it’s one of the last classes you get. So, by the time you have one, you probably already have a Duelist handling your magical needs and God-Hand or Rune Knight healing.
Mages make great healers. They learn Cure, which can target one ally or all allies. The more skill points you put into it, the more health it restores. Recover can remove ailments from allies, with the max level curing every possible ailment. Resurrect is the best resurrection spell in the game and, at its max level, makes it like the ally it’s healing never died in the first place. It also has Flame, Freeze, and Shock Veils that protect one ally for five turns and perform a fire, ice, or electric counter attack against any enemy that dares attack them.
The Mage’s elemental spells are amazing too. They have six, two for each element. One variation only attacks a single foe, while the other attacks all enemies on the field. Flame, Freeze, and Shock are the spells that only hit single enemies, while Volcano, Blizzard, and Volt Storm hit all enemies. Specializing in at least two elements is the smartest thing to do. It may even be wise to have one Mage that only focuses on damaging enemies, and another who’d completely dedicated to healing.
While it may take a bit more time getting these later classes accustomed to your party and fitting them into your established strategies, the Fortuner, Rune Knight, Banisher, and Mage are also amazingly helpful characters. The Fortuner and Rune Knight do a wonderful job of supporting your party while still dealing damage, while the Banisher and Mage are capable of coming into a fight and easily punishing every enemy. Give them some time; you’ll find the right warriors and wizards!
7th Dragon III Code: VFD will come to the Nintendo 3DS on July 12, 2016.
