Radiata Stories Walkthrough

[top] Radiata Stories Detailed Checklist
Version  4.9 © 2006-2008 by Bill Pringle, all rights reserved.
In addition to being a FAQ/Walkthrough, the purpose of this document is
to help you determine how best to recruit people for the RPG video game
*Radiata Stories* by Square-Enix. If you aren't familiar with the game,
it is a combination of Final Fantasy, Zelda, Suikoden, and a few other
games. What makes this game so neat is the large number and variety of
characters that can be recruited.
Pre-Split      Human Path      Non-Human Path
Groups      Post-Game      Misc
[toc] Table of Contents
* Introduction
o Purpose
o Game Play / Battles
o Leveling Up
o Skills
o Weapons
o Radiata Knight Overview
o Theater Vancoor Overview
o Recruitment Requirements
o Initial Party
* Before the Split
o Friends List Created
o Initial Friends List
o First Missions
o Jack's Promotion
o Large Man in Vancoor Square
o Ridley's Birthday Party
o Jack's Choice - Human or Non-Human Path
* Human Path
o Meeting at Castle
o Leave for Wind Valley
o Wind Valley
o Duel Gawain
o Meet with Dynas
o Meet Genius in the Sewers
o Ganz's Letter
o Fight at Lupus Gate
o End of the World
* Non-Human Path
o Meeting with Parsec
o Goblin Haven
o First Fight with Gawain
o Defeat Gawain
o Escort Gawain to Fort Helencia
o Fight Elwen
o Cross and the Fire Dragon
o End of the World
* Post Game
* Members of Each Group
o Theater Vancoor
o Olacion Order
o Vareth Institute
o Void Community
o Non-Guild Humans
o Non-Humans
* Miscellaneous
o Easter Eggs and Silly Things
o Fireworks Date
o Gotchas
o External Resources
o Thanks / Credits
o Version History
Top of Page
[intro] Introduction
* Purpose
* Game Play / Battles
* Leveling Up
* Skills
* Weapons
* Radiata Knight Overview
* Theater Vancoor Overview
* Recruitment Requirements
* Initial Party
This page can be found in two forms: an HTML (web) page at
http://BillPringle.com/games/radiata_checklist.html, and as a text file
on http://www.gamefaqs.com/. The HTML page will probably be updated more
often, and tend to be the latest version. The HTML web page will include
hyperlinks, so you can click on a link to find the appropriate section.
The text file was created by the FireFox browser, which inserts
hyper-links inside angle brackets (). To find that location
with a text editor, use the search feature to find the target name in
square brackets ([like-this]). The link inside angle brackets will
always start with a pound sign (#), indicating that the target is on the
current page. The square brackets won't have that pound sign. For
example, to find the target of link , search for [intro]. If you
are going to have an electronic copy of this FAQ, I recommend that you
get the HTML version instead of the text file.
Not all details of recruitment are included, but enough to help you plan
who to recruit and when. For a more detailed description of how to
recruit a specific character, I had recommended that you use the web
site http://www.divinemight.com/rs_recruitment/index.php/Main_Page. This
wiki seemd to have gone away, which is a shame. As a result, I have
taken the contents of this FAQ as the basis of a walkthrough at Strategy
Wiki , a side project of
wikipedia . (If you aren't
familiar with Wikipedia, you should be.)
If you find any problems and/or have any questions, you can e-mail me at
wrp103@gmail.com
. Make sure
you have "Radiata Stories" in the subject. I get a lot of spam, and will
delete things without looking at them if I don't recognize the sender
and the subject line doesn't stand out as legit (for example, a message
with a subject of "a question" will probably get deleted without me
looking at it.)
Top of Page
[purpose] Purpose
Although you can use this document as a walk through, that isn't its
main purpose. The game is pretty good at telling you what you can/should
do next, so a traditional walk through is less important. If you are
ever in doubt, press R1 to bring up the map. You will see a green swirl
where you should be headed. There are several places in the game where
if you try to go into an area you shouldn't, Jack will make a comment
and retreat. The hard (and most enjoyable) part of the game is
recruiting characters. There are a number of resources that will tell
you how to recruit a given character, but not so many that will tell you
when and why you should recruit them.
I also recommend that you buy the Official Strategy Guide, since they
have some good maps, plus complete bestiary statistics. There are,
however, a number of errors in that guide, and I will point out the ones
I've noticed.
I have tried to keep spoilers to a minimum, but there are times that you
need to know something else will be happening later. I don't explain the
content of cut scenes, which should reduce spoilers a bit. Actually, the
game is relatively easy to follow. If you ever get stuck, hold down R1
to see the map. Your current destination will be shown with a swirl. If
there aren't any swirls, then you probably need to sleep or enter your
house to progress the game.
For each phase of the game, I will tell you what missions you will have,
with a comment on what you will get from each mission. I will not give
you step by step instructions because, frankly, you probably don't need
them. The game is pretty good at making sure you are doing what you
should be doing. For example, when you are on your first few missions,
if you try to turn away from the path to your destination, the leader of
the group will stop you and tell you that is not the way. If there are
some optional side quests, I will mention them and give you enough
information to succeed with those quests.
One of the things I enjoy about this game is the sense of discovery as I
wander around the world. Even though I had the official strategy guide,
I didn't bother with all the items that could be found, etc. Take time
to explore each area of the world. Talk to everyone you see. Kick
everything available looking for items. Try every door and see what's
behind it. An RPG is like a fine meal: the goal should be to enjoy the
game, not see how fast you can finish it.
I do give you detailed step by step instructions for the final dungeon
of the game, since the map in the official strategy guide is confusing
and has errors, and I haven't seen an accurate map of that area that was
generally available.
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[gameplay] Game Play / Battles
A word of warning: avoid button mashing. If you are the kind of person
that keeps mashing the "X" button during a battle, get out of that
habit. The problem is that each time you click the button, it queues an
attack. If you kill an enemy and there are still attacks queued, the
target of the remaining attacks is the next one in the list of monsters.
That might be the one right next to you, or it could be the one clear
across the battle field. If you think you are close to killing an enemy,
click the "X" button and wait to see what happens. If it drops, approach
the next closest enemy and press "X" again. That way, you can
concentrate on the enemies you want to defeat next, and avoid running
clear across the field, past a bunch of enemies, to get somebody over in
a corner that you hadn't even noticed, let alone was interested in. ;^)
You will sometimes see one of the enemies with what looks like lightning
bolts over them. This indicates that they are calling for more help. If
they succeed, another enemy will appear and join in the fight. Since
each enemies gets you a certain amount of experience, you might want to
give them time to call somebody before you take them out.
The game has its own internal time system, which is roughly one hour of
game time every minute of real time. This means that a new day starts
every 24 minutes, or about once every half hour. The day is divided into
day and night, with day running from 6AM to 6PM, and night from 6PM to
6AM of the following day. You need to pay attention to the time of day
for a number of reasons. Each character has their own schedule which
doesn't vary from day to day, until they are in your current party, or
if they are involved in a current mission. Some character recruitment
can only occur during specific time periods (such as when they are in
their room, or at some other location). Some characters behave
differently or have different abilities, depending on the time of day.
For example, those who have either the King of Day or King of Night
skills. One of the more interesting characters is Cornelia / Rachel, who
transforms between a little girl and a young woman. If she is in your
party, she will change appearances and fighting styles, depending on the
time of day or night. Her name on the friends list is always where
Cornelia should appear, but is listed as Rachel during her transformation.
There are also times when, if you enter your house between a certain
time period, it will cause an event to trigger, which will progress the
game. By avoiding your house except late at night / early in the
morning, you can avoid triggering these events, allowing you to do
things like level up and recruit people until you are ready for the next
stage of the game. (And, when you are in your house, don't sleep, or
that will also trigger an event.)
Monsters regenerate at midnight. Other things reset at midnight as well,
such as who you have dueled, and some recruitments require things
happening on different days. You can use this to your advantage
sometimes. For example, if you need to talk to or duel someone on two
different days, you can do it just before midnight, wait a minute or two
until after midnight, and then do it again. If you clear out an area
just before midnight, you can wait until the monsters are reset, and
then clear it out again. Of course, that means you will have to wait
until the following day if you need to do it a third time.
There are certain times in the game when the next phase happens when you
enter your house during a certain time period (usually during the day).
At other times, you need to sleep in your house to trigger the event. I
generally tell you when you want to avoid your house if you don't want
the game to progress. You can take your time to level up, earn money for
items, etc. as long as you avoid your house during the day. What I
usually do is enter my house late at night (after 10pm), save the game,
and then leave to do whatever I want. A good rule of thumb is that you
don't want to enter your house if Flau isn't sitting on the wall of the
steps. (Of course, if you have Flau in your party, check the time instead.)
You will find a record player in your house, as well as in Fort Helencia
if you choose the non-human path. You can insert records into the
player, and then play whatever songs you want. Records carry over
between games, so you only have to buy them once. If you need them in a
later game, go to your house (or fort) and take them out.
Take time to explore the world. You can have a fun time just following
certain characters around all day and seeing where they go, what they
do, etc. Take time to admire the attention to detail that is throughout
the game. See the section Easter Eggs and Silly Things  for
some suggestions on things to do and things to look for.
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[level] Leveling Up
Like many role playing games, leveling up can make the fights easier.
One of the unique things about this game is the ability to duel
characters. You don't have to go out into the world or a dungeon to find
a fight. Just kick somebody. If you kick somebody twice, they should
fight you one-on-one. Some characters won't duel, so if they keep saying
the same thing, try somebody else. You can only duel someone once per
day. Fortunately, they don't seem to remember that you kicked them,
other than a brief comment immediately after the fight. If you lose a
duel, don't worry, the game isn't over, but you will have an HP of 1, so
don't forget to heal (or talk to Miranda) before you get into a real fight.
When fighting in dungeons and in the world, you will notice that if you
see more than one monster, that after the first fight, some of the other
monsters may not be there. If you leave the area and come back, they
will re-appear. In general, stronger monsters will be less likely to
disappear than weaker ones, but it isn't always that way.
If you do a lot of leveling up like I do, then you can pretty much
ignore all the strategy hints you read about for the boss fights. Just
plow in and start hacking, telling your healer to concentrate on you,
and it will be over in no time.
If you don't level up, then links will be more important. Using a link
allows all members of your party to share the combined skills of
everyone in your party. I only tend to use links when I need to learn a
new skill or early in later games when my party members are still weak,
but that's me; you might like to experiment with links. There's no "one
right way" to play this game; if you're having fun, then you're doing it
the right way.
I like the Septem Cave the best for leveling up before the split. In the
very early stages of the game it might be a challenge, but as long as
you have a good spear, you should be able to get through that area just
fine, especially if you have the "Prevent Freeze" skill equipped. When
you are in the second part of the cave, just before the exit, you will
run into a large iceburg. Once in a while, after it is defeated, there
will be another larva-like monster. This is the rare Killer Queen, who
will give you a lot of experience, gold, and berries if you defeat it.
Be careful, though, because she is tough. Don't be afraid to use your
volty on it. Sometimes, after the fight with the iceburg, she doesn't
show up. If that happens, exit the cave and come back in to fight her.
If you are at a low level and keep getting killed in Septem Cave, then
you should start off in the sewers below Theater Vancoor. That is a good
place to kill a few minutes, and pick up some gold and experience at the
same time. Once you are strong enough, you can do whatever you need to
do during the day, and then clear out Septem Cave, and get home before
daybreak to save your game.
After the split, your best experience comes from battling members of the
other group. If you pick the human path, use the Travel Pig to the Dark
Elves location (Mikey won't fight you, but won't let you in, either.)
Travel east, then southwest around the lake, and then head towards Fort
Helencia. You can then use the pig to get to the Goblin village and
wander around there. Towards the very end of the game, the Blood Orc
homeland becomes available. You can get some great experience there.
What I often do during the non-human path is use the Travel Pig to Lupus
Gate, and then walk from there to Earth Valley, taking all the side
roads, including doubling back to the other gate at Radiata City. Be
careful when you run into Godwin and Fernando (he is actually on the
bridge); their volty blast can take out one of your characters. As long
as it isn't Jack, that's not a problem, so if you see one of them
flashing, just have Jack defend until the character is beaten or has
used his volty. When you get to Earth Valley, take the Travel Pig to the
Tria Region and fight the troops around there. That should get you a lot
of experience and money. I can usually level the entire party up a
couple of levels each day.
Top of Page
[skills] Skills
One of the reasons you want to recruit characters is so that you can
learn their skills. If you link with a character that has a skill that
you don't currently have, then after some number of links you will learn
that skill. Once you have learned the skill, you need to fight with it
equipped some number of times in order to level up the skill. Leveling
up doesn't require links, any fights will do. You can go down to the
sewers under Theater Vancoor to get into a lot of easy fights. This is
useful since the character you are trying to learn the skill from is
probably a low level character. Since the monsters in that area stay
fairly weak, the low level characters have a better chance to survive a
fight.
You can fill your party with characters having skills that you don't
know yet, then equip yourself with Auto Cure and link your party
together for each fight until you have learned the skills. Some skills
are learned faster than others, so if you are in the sewers under
Theater Vancoor, you can go to the first floor and swap out the
character with the skill you just learned for someone who has another
skill you need. You can keep this up until you learn all the available
skills, or you run out of monsters in the basement. Remember that there
are times when you don't want to go back to your house to sleep to force
a new day.
The skills that I like the best are:
Auto Cure
You can learn this from Kain, Genius, Mason, or Stefan
When you start a new game (other than the first time), equip this
skill and you will almost never get killed. You will be able to go
into the dwarf caves on your own when a knight, and duel all the
characters in Earth Valley.
When you set up your initial party, use links a lot with auto cure
equipped so that each character keeps getting healed. This will let
you level up your characters without having to spend a lot of time
explicitly healing them.
Absorb HP
You can only learn this from Donkey, which is why you might want to
recruit him if you don't have it, even if you are planning on
chosing the human side.
This skill heals you a percentage of the damage you do to the enemy.
If you keep hitting fast enough and hard enough, you won't need
healing very often.
Tri-Emblem
After you have beaten the Ethereal Queen, you will get this skill.
It boosts all your parameters, similar to King of Day and King of
Night combined. Remember, if you use links, it will boost your
party's stats too. This is very handy at the beginning of the game,
when your party has low levels.
If you don't have this skill, you can use King of Day or King of
Night, as long as you remember to switch them when the time changes.
Full Power
You can learn this from Gruel, Fernando, Galvados,or Sebastian
Equip this skill just before you use your volty attack. It increases
the damage. For stronger bosses, you might want to use Save Volty
instead.
Save Volty
You can learn this from Curtis or Gobrey
Your volty attack won't use up all of your volty meter. Equip this
skill just before you use your volty attack on a very powerful boss
that will require multiple volty attacks. That way, you will be able
to launch your next volty attack in less time than normal. You
probably only want to use this for weaker bosses, or if you have
another boss fight coming up soon.
Fierce Defense
You can learn this from Edgar, Interlude, Leban, Leona, or Wal.
This skill will reduce the damage you take when you are blocking. If
your enemy is about to use their volty attack, quickly use an herb
to get to full HP, equip this skill, and hold down the "X" button.
You should be able to survive the attack.
I use this skill to beat strong characters with fierce volty attacks
like Gerald, Elwen, etc.
Status Cure
You can learn this from Ardoph, Flora, Morfinn, or Rika
This reduces the amount of time that you are inflicted with any
status ailment. You might want to use "Stop Afflictions" to reduce
the chances of getting afflicted, but if that doesn't work, you may
not be able to switch to "Status Cure", which is why I tend to use
this rather than the other.
100t Body
You can learn this from David, Gabe, Jill, or Walter
This reduces the chances of you being knocked down. It will allow
you to continue to attack rather than keep getting back up and
attacking again. You probably want to instruct your healer to
concentrate on you if you do this.
King of Day / Night
You can learn King of the Day from Elwen, and King of the Night from
Nyx or Gawain
These skills increases your stats during the specified time period.
If you don't have Tri-Emblem, then these are the ones you want to
use. Just remember to switch to the other skill when the time changes.
If you need to attack a character that has one of these skills, it
is a good idea to time it so that you fight them when their skill
isn't in effect. (Fight Elwen at night, and Nyx during the day.)
There are lots of other skills, and you might prefer some others,
depending on your fighting style. As I keep saying, there is no "one
true way" to play this game. If you are having fun and not getting
killed off, then you are playing it just fine.
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[weapons] Weapons
Like many RPGs, you have a selection of weapons you can use. You can
also learn various attacks for each weapon. Once you have learned an
attack, you always have it across all the games you play. You learn the
various attacks by using a training dummy. Kick the dummy while you are
holding the weapon you want to work on and you will be given a challenge
(e.g., defeat enemy). If you succeed, you can learn a new attack.
*Note: * If the challenge is "Receive no damage", all you have to do is
run around avoiding the enemies so that you don't take any damage. (You
don't have to defeat the enemies without taking damage, just avoid
getting hit.)
There are two training dummies in the training room of the castle, two
in Theater Vancoor, and one just outside Fort Helencia. If you haven't
built up skills by the time you first get to Fort Helencia (the
Crocogator mission), take some time there, since you have a healing spot
and a save flag available.
Each weapon has a CP value, and each type of attack also has a CP value.
You can select a series of up to 5 (combo) attacks as long as the total
CP value of the attacks is less than the value of the weapon. Each time
you press the circle button the next attack is performed. Unlike similar
games, button mashing can cause problems. If you queue up four hits on
an enemy, and kill it after two hits, Jack will still perform the
remaining hits, swinging at thin air. In the meantime, another enemy can
be attacking you.
You can change the weapon as well as the attacks at any time during the
battle. At the beginning of a battle with a number of enemies, you can
select a spear and wide circle attacks that will hit a number of enemies
at once. When there is only one enemy left, you can change the attacks,
or you can switch to a sword or axe, and use strong attacks. Available
weapons are swords, two-handed swords, axes, and spears.
At a minimum, you should use the training dummies through enough levels
so that you can release your volty attack. You only have to do this
once. Your weapon attacks are carried over from one game to the next.
You can sometimes get items during training fights. The one you should
know about is the "Defeat a Blood Orc" during the Axe training.
Sometimes the enemy will drop a Blood Orc Horn, which is a key item you
need to recruit a couple of characters. Since you can only carry one of
them at a time, since it doesn't carry over from one game to the next,
and since you don't get to fight Blood Orcs in the field until later in
the game, if you want to recruit those characters early in the game, you
need to use this training mission to get that item and recruit the
characters.
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[knight] Radiata Knight Overview
Most of this document deals with the game after you have been fired from
the knights and join Theater Vancoor, when you are able to start
recruiting characters. The beginning of the game pretty much leads you
through whatever you need to do. There are some things you can do once
you have arrived at some location for a mission, as well as some things
you can do in the castle.
The important thing to remember is that whenever you have a chance, you
want to level up your character as much as possible. This can be done by
kicking characters to get them into a duel, as well as defeating various
monsters in the field (or basement of the castle). Since the monsters
regenerate at midnight, you can clear out an area, then wait until
midnight, and clear it again. Most missions have a time limit, but it
only kicks in once you have arrived and reported to whoever you were to
visit. If you delay that meeting, you can prolong the time you have to
level up. The higher your level, the better you will do when you start
your own missions, and the easier it will be to recruit certain characters.
Kicking isn't limited to people. You can find items by kicking objects.
Get in the habit of kicking everything and everyone in sight.
Part of the replay value of Radiata Stories is that the game has such a
rich world with a diverse collection of characters. By selecting
different characters in your party, the fights will take on different
flavors. There is a lot of detail throughout the game, and a lot of fun
things you can do in addition to the basic game. Look at the section on
Easter Eggs and Silly Things
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[vancoor] Theater Vancoor Overview
The basic flow of the game is that you have some missions with your
squad that you must take (there are only a few of these at the start of
the game), and you can take a number of solo missions. In general, once
you receive orders for a mission, you are expected to travel to some
location, complete the mission task, and then report back to Theater
Vancoor and speak to Thanos. If the client is known, then you would
usually speak to them before and after the mission task to get
instructions and report the results to the client. Once this is done,
you can speak to Thanos to get your pay and see if there are any more
missions you can take on at this time. Usually you want to perform all
the missions in the order they are listed, although you can accept them
in any order if you prefer. You need to be a little careful if you
change the order of the missions, because some missions are only
available during certain stages of the game, and some missions will
trigger events that might make the rest of the missions unavailable. I
will usually tell you if there are any reasons you might want to perform
any missions in a certain order. If there are no more missions, then you
probably have to sleep to progress the game.
If you want to recruit Thanos (which is needed if you want to recruit
Elwen and/or Nyx), then you must accept all missions and report back to
Thanos at the completion of the mission. To prevent missing any
missions, avoid going into your house during the day, and only save when
you get there; don't sleep. Wait until 9pm before you go in and save. If
Flau isn't sitting on the wall, don't go in. If you were waiting for
her, wait a few minutes after she gets there before you go in, since she
gets there a few minutes before 9pm. Don't sleep unless you want to
progress the game. Once Thanos tells you there aren't any more jobs,
then you probably need to sleep to make the game progress. You can do
that right away, or you can take time to go out and level up your party,
recruit more people, earn some more money, etc.
If you recruit every possible character (which takes at least two times
through the game), you will be able to view a picture of the main
characters. If you will be taking the human path, you probably want to
recruit the guild leaders, which means you want to recruit all the
members of the different guilds. The only reasons to recruit any of the
farmers are to be complete, or possibly for a specific skill.
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[reqs] Recruitment Requirements
There are actually two different "Friends List": one you can access from
the options menu, and another located either next to Thanos in Theater
Vancoor, or on a desk in Fort Helencia. The one in your menu is the
total number of friends that you have recruited, including any previous
games. The one on the desk is the list of people you can use for your
party in this game. So, if you want to use a given character at some
point in the current game, you will have to recruit them during this
game, even if they appear in the friends list in your menu.
It is a good idea to check out who you have recruited already. every so
often, especially before the game progresses. Go to the Friends List on
the desk and click on L1 to sort the list alphabetically. Then look over
the list of people who you wanted to recruit, and make sure they are all
on the list. If you are trying to recruit several people at the same
time, it is very easy to forget something, especially if you remember
doing that in a previous game.
There are a number of requirements that can affect your ability to
recruit a specific character. In every case, you will at least have to
talk to them. You should continue to talk to them until either they join
or they start to repeat themselves. If they repeat, then something isn't
right and you can't recruit them at that time. Check all the
requirements for recruiting them and make sure they have been done.
Also, if the character is involved in a mission, they may not be
available for the rest of the day. For example, after training the
monks, you will have to wait until the following day before you can find
any of them to talk to.
In most cases, once a character becomes available, they remain available
for the rest of the game (or to the split). If you try to recruit
someone, but you find out that you are missing something, do whatever
you need to and go back and try to recruit them again. There are a few
characters, though, that are only available for a certain period of
time, and if you don't recruit them by then, you will not be able to
recruit them during that game.
A number of characters are recruited by beating them in a fight. In most
of these cases, if you lose, you can try again the following day. You
can continue trying until you win a fight.
The criteria for a specific character can be any combination of the
following conditions:
Major Game Events
A number of characters can only be recruited after some specific
event has occurred in the game. For example, you can only recruit
Flau and Rynka after you have received Ganz's letter. Some of the
events will always occur (e.g., Link Tutorial), but others may not
(e.g., Nocturn's letter to Gerald). If you don't cause an event to
happen, then you won't be able to recruit that character until
another time through the game.
Time of Day
Some characters can only be recruited between certain times in the
day. Since each character has their own schedule, this implies it
will happen at a specific location. In this document, if the time is
important, I will usually tell you the approximate time range, and
where it will take place. The actual time may be off by a few
minutes, depending on when the character arrives and/or leaves. The
official strategy guide gives their schedule to the minute, but I
have found a number of cases where I think the times are close, but
wrong.
If