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Originally Posted by Psykodelik A little past getting 1st ally. Not sure if it's a major spoiler but just in-case. So I just finished the trials and notice your familiar can evolve. I've already met thing from the manhole and got the jumbo stones. None of my pets want them (the has metamorphable(sp?)). Where do I get the ones that can? Or do I have to make them. If so what's needed?

Answer and a couple spoilers about using them: There are regular ones and you should start finding them in battles soon. I also think I got a couple from running errands. I'm not sure if you can buy them, although maybe you can later in the game. The ones given at the Temple of Trials are for the final evolution. IMPORTANT, using them will bring your evolved character to level one, so don't metamorphose(?) several of them right before a boss battle. It's not tough to get them back up to speed and better than before, but it's nothing like Pokemon where an evolution means an immediate boost in stats.

I'm about 18 hours in and have acquired a third person in my party and am now off to another continent. I'm really enjoying this game and I honestly can't remember the last time I've had this much fun with a JRPG.

Thanks Tux. I'll be on the lookout. I'm at work now but want to play!

Really enjoying this game so far, turned in my DLC to get my extra characters from the guide and my preorder bonus.

I did find something interesting when I was checking out the wizards companion book in the game and when you zoom in on the pictures of the familiars something happens, so feel free to check it out. Not sure if it has already been mentioned or not, but was a nice surprise for me.

At any rate time to play.

Originally Posted by IanKazimer I loaded him up on chocolate when I saw that friggin' animation. It's so good. Love your avatar, by the way. Every day IS great at your Junes!

Haha, yeah same here. I shove chocolate to my mite every chance I get.

Thanks That damn jingle has been stuck in my head for weeks. I also think you'll get a kick out of this. Unfortunately, it isn't a department store but rather a love hotel

Originally Posted by Loonknight Really enjoying this game so far, turned in my DLC to get my extra characters from the guide and my preorder bonus. I did find something interesting when I was checking out the wizards companion book in the game and when you zoom in on the pictures of the familiars something happens, so feel free to check it out. Not sure if it has already been mentioned or not, but was a nice surprise for me. At any rate time to play.

Oohhh i might check that out later.

I just finished the trails at the temple and about to go on to the next event.

And sonofabitch, having to morph Mite sucks. My other familiars are level 17/18, but Mite had to go back to level 1. Granted, after a few battles, he's already up to level 9 but he's still way too weak to be used in battle. I hate having to level familiars... it goes nicely for the first few levels, but then slows down greatly. It's going to take a while before he can be useful again.

I also wish there were better tactics options for non-controller character. If I tell Esther to do what she wants, she depletes her MP after 3-4 fights. If I tell her not to use abilities, she sometimes uses magic users (instead of attackers) and takes on a lot of damage (and no, it's not because of stamina). If I tell her to act as support, she's basically useless unless I need to be healed .

Yea, my biggest pet Peeve with Esther is that rather than using her own character's 4mp heal spell, she'll use one of the familiar's 11mp spell whenever she's down 13 health.

I havent really messed with the tactics menu, hopefully theres an option for "Dont recover until you're down to X health"

If anybody here wants to see some Ni No Kuni in action, I'll be streaming it at http://twitch.tv/smashpad in a few minutes.

So this is going to be a theorycrafting post with regards to familiars and min/maxing stats. If you're down with that and want some tips, read on. I will try to keep this spoiler free as possible and will use a DLC familiar for my tests, as they're incredibly overpowered.

To start, each familiar is part of a genus and each character has three select synergies with those classifications. For Oliver, they're Milites, Vermes, and Dracones. The importance of matching familiars with the character is a flat 10% all stats boost. While this isn't very important early in the game, it will scale up as you level and towards endgame be the difference between 5 points and 50.

Next, I'll cover how celestial signs work in the field and provide tips that most people aren't aware of. Signs are the proverbial rock, paper, scissors mechanics of the game but also have a chance to roll a double-sign whenever a familiar is obtained. For example, Star has a natural boon of 5% resistance to storm and poison; double-star has 10%. Additionally, Star is strong versus Sun and gains 20% boosted damage with double-star gaining 30%! Star is considered one of the more favorable signs as well, given nearly all bounty hunts are sun signs (bosses have no sign). Pro-tip: when redeeming your DLC ticket (roughly 5-6 hours in) Griffy can roll double-star, so save before redeeming and reload if he's not! It took me only three tries to get it, so the rate is fairly high. As for the other two DLC characters (Golden Hurly and Flutterby), it is the community consensus that they cannot roll double-sign after hours of testing and none sighted.

As you may have guessed, my test familiar is Griffy (Amazon pre-order bonus) and is a real beast both literally and figuratively. He is of the Aves genus, so pairing him with the first character to join your party is best for synergy. Next I'll provide a stat growth chart for his first generation and then cover some basics.

LvL | 01 | 03 | 04 | 05 | 06 | 07 | 08 | 09 | 10 | 11
Atk | 25 | 39 | 46 | 52 | 60 | 67 | 73 | 80 | 86 | 93
Def | 23 | 36 | 41 | 48 | 55 | 60 | 67 | 72 | 78 | 84
M.A | 22 | 34 | 39 | 45 | 50 | 56 | 61 | 67 | 72 | 78
M.D | 17 | 26 | 30 | 35 | 39 | 44 | 48 | 51 | 56 | 60
Acc | 18 | 28 | 34 | 38 | 42 | 48 | 52 | 57 | 61 | 67
Evs | 19 | 30 | 36 | 41 | 47 | 51 | 57 | 62 | 67 | 72

*Stats captured with 10% boost from character synergy

The first thing I want to go over is that familiars can evolve once they learn all the tricks of that generation. In Griffy's case, this is achieved at level seven for first gen and level 15 for second gen, keeping in mind that evolution resets their level to zero and a % of stats carry over to the next. This means that while you could evolve Griffy at level seven, it is wiser to gain four more levels first to maximize the stat carry over since his base stats grow incredibly fast and at an average rate (meaning you gain roughly the same amount of stats for each level; he is not an early or late bloomer). Ultimately it is your decision, as the difference in stats is about 5-7% at absolute cap.

Lastly, Griffy loves Ice Cream, a food that boosts evasion. While this will increase his familiarity faster than other foods you have options to consider. Griffy's PD (pre-determined) command is psyche-up, meaning he can't defend or evade strong attacks. This makes him very much a glass cannon versus magic attacks since his magic defense is low. As far as I know, you can't evade magic attacks (direct or AOE) making this a useless stat to boost (after extensive testing, evasion only factors physical attacks) on a low evasion familiar. Instead, consider feeding him chocolate to boost his physical attacks. The best defense is a strong offense after all. You do not need to worry about waiting to feed your familiar until the last generation, because these stats are added as a bonus and not factored into the paper doll when evolving. Also, the maximum for points gained from feeding is 50 total once all five hearts have been filled. Keep in mind that when your familiar is paired with the proper character, this also scales with the 10% bonus so increasing Griffy's main stat (attack) is in your best interest as you will squeeze out a few more points than if you were boosting a lesser stat to round him out.

A note on Griffy's final evolution:
His Ice form will have higher attack, affinity towards water, but weakness to fire. His Fire form will have higher defense, affinity towards fire, but weakness to water. I very much recommend evolving to the latter because fire will help immensely near the end of the game.

It there a way to make the non-controller player defend? This is a huge issue during with boss fights...

Games starting to piss me off lol

15 hours in and not 1 of my characters or familiars have a revive type spell or even a spell to replenish MP, this is my only pet peeve with this game so far!!

Originally Posted by Vinny It there a way to make the non-controller player defend? This is a huge issue during with boss fights...

Eventually. Just used it in my first boss fight and man did those miracle moves shit from the boss like candy.

Originally Posted by Souljah Games starting to piss me off lol 15 hours in and not 1 of my characters or familiars have a revive type spell or even a spell to replenish MP, this is my only pet peeve with this game so far!!

Are you specifically

Originally Posted by Draekon Eventually. Just used it in my first boss fight and man did those miracle moves shit from the boss like candy.

If I'm at the town where you fight the alchemy genie, how far away am I (roughly) from that ability? I'm guessing it's one of those perks of completing quests, right?

And man, that genie is kicking my ass... well, Esther's ass actually. .

Originally Posted by argyle While this gen has definitely been a lot dryer for JRPGs than last gen, there have still been some great ones released (with the two best being Xenoblade and Vesperia imo). So I wouldn't really call this a return to form for the genre, but it IS a return to form for Level-5 on consoles. This game feels like the natural follow-up to their best PS2 games, Dragon Quest 8 & Dark Cloud 2. I'm extremely glad to see them back in action, since they were one of my favorite developers on the PS2.

The Mount Rushmore of JRPG's this gen to me are:

Tales of Vesperia
Valkyria Chronicles
Lost Odyssey
Ys Seven

Honorable Mentions
Eternal Sonata
Tales of Graces f
Blue Dragon
White Knight Chronicles 1/2 (1 from the remastered version on the 2nd game's disc.)

We'll see if this can crack my top 4 once I get it.

Originally Posted by Vinny Are you specifically If I'm at the town where you fight the alchemy genie, how far away am I (roughly) from that ability? I'm guessing it's one of those perks of completing quests, right? And man, that genie is kicking my ass... well, Esther's ass actually. .

Are you askin Where am i?

I'm a bit further than you going by that other comment you posted so don't want to mention much

Originally Posted by Vinny If I'm at the town where you fight the alchemy genie, how far away am I (roughly) from that ability? I'm guessing it's one of those perks of completing quests, right? And man, that genie is kicking my ass... well, Esther's ass actually. .

If you're there, then you have a few more hours until you get to the point where you acquire it. More specifically (While still being vague), it's a little bit after you acquire the boat . More specifically (yet still vague) after the boss fight on the boat on your way to the next destination

As awesome as Griffy looked I had to sell him on ebay, I mean he sold for $49! Who in the pays that much for a dlc character I have no idea but it I'm not complaining!

Just a side note, I'm only like 3 hrs in but I really love this game so far. I just want to go exploring, the world feels really vibrant and alive. I can't wait to play more and really sink my teeth into this game.

Originally Posted by Souljah Are you askin Where am i? I'm a bit further than you going by that other comment you posted so don't want to mention much

Sorry, my bad... I started to write something then... I spaced out and forgot to finish writing.

But you answered what I was going to ask anyway... sucks that there's no revive spells (so far, anyway).

Originally Posted by Draekon If you're there, then you have a few more hours until you get to the point where you acquire it. More specifically (While still being vague), it's a little bit after you acquire the boat . More specifically (yet still vague) after the boss fight on the boat on your way to the next destination

Thank god. Can't wait to get that.

I need to start weening out familiars without defensive skills. I'm sure the game will pick up at some point where you can't simply overpower enemies.

Originally Posted by cgarb84 As awesome as Griffy looked I had to sell him on ebay, I mean he sold for $49! Who in the pays that much for a dlc character I have no idea but it I'm not complaining!

Griffy is quite possibly the most broken familiar in the game at this point. Extremely high, well-rounded stats with low level caps for first and second gen. I'm very close to capping him a second time and choosing his final evolution and I can tell you for a fact he makes boss fights much, much easier.

Originally Posted by Vinny It there a way to make the non-controller player defend? This is a huge issue during with boss fights...

It's stupid but you don't get it until about halfway through the game. I thought I had missed something in the tactics training at first, but once they gave me the ability I was like are you ing kidding me? Luckily it's square to defend, triangle to resume attacks so no menus to navigate. If I had one complaint about this game it would definitely be the flow of combat because I'm so used to hotkeys on PC heh. Some attacks come super fast, so it's impossible to cancel out of your attack and navigate to defend in time. It just feels like this game babies you a bit too much in slowly unlocking new abilities, but then expects you to perform in combat with a gimpy UI. I like twitch gameplay and the combat feels like it should be fast paced, but the system just feels unrewarding at times.