suikoden 3.txt

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Walkthrough for Suikoden III for the PS2, North American Release

Version 2.25 copyright dan crenshaw ([email protected]) 2002Last update 1/28/2003

************************* SPOILER WARNING ********************************************************* SPOILER WARNING ********************************

This walkthrough contains spoilers related to Suikoden III. The spoilers havebeen put in so that nothing that happens later in the story is mentioned in anearlier section of the walkthrough. However, later sections of the walkthroughmay mention key previous events as reference points. If you'd rather not riskhaving something related to the story ruined for you, stop reading now.

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Legal Junk:

Whatever you do with this Walkthrough in terms of private use is no concern ofmine. Please do not alter it, distribute it, post it, or do anything relatedto public use without permission. If you intend to print it out, make sureyour printer/word processor's option for word wrap is off.

This Walkthrough should only be posted at gamefaqs.com. If you see thisdocument posted anywhere else in part or in its entirety, it is without theauthor's permission.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------Contact info:

I WILL NOT reply to any e-mails that ask questions already answered in thisdocument. This applies especially to recruiting questions.

Comments, suggestions, corrections are welcome as long as they pertain to thisdocument. It's very helpful if you put "Suikoden" in the e-mail's subject

header so I'll know it's related to this document. Any information you provideto me will be properly credited via e-mail name (minus the domain name) unlessyou prefer another way to be credited or do not wish to be credited at all. Iwill credit such information as from "anonymous".

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------Update info:

The changes for this version:

-Added Chris level 99 trick in detail per e-mail requests. Credit and manythanks to Blue Moon for permitting me to put the trick in this document

This document contains all the content I planned for it (and then some). Anyfurther updates, beyond some minor clarifications/corrections, are not plannedunless a major secret is discovered.

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Part I: Introduction and Walkthrough----------------------------------------

1. Introduction (How do I find stuff in this document?)

2. Top 10 e-Mail Questions2a. What do I get for loading Suikoden II data?2b. Should I play Suikoden I and II first?2c. How long does this game take to complete?2d. All about recruiting2e. What skills should my characters learn?2f. Why do you recommend doing...?2g. Agh! I can't get [Recruit/Item] and I'm going to smash my PS2!2h. Why can't I go to chapter 4?2i. Why aren't the lottery results switching like you said?2j. Where can I get a Statue S?

3. General Questions3a. Introduction3b. The Trinity Sight System3c. Why this order of play?3d. Skills/Stats3e. Support Characters

3f. Runes and Magic3g. Battle Formations/The Pair System3h. Strategy Battles3i. Duels3j. Character Types3k. Treasure bosses3l. Recipes, Old Books, Medal Sets, Antiques, Bath Items, and Scripts3m. What's the Chris Level 99 trick? Should I do it?3n. What is the stat stones trick?3o. I need money and lots of it!3p. I was just walking around minding my own business, then the screen

turned yellow and this funny music played and this monster killed me!3q. Looting corpses

3r. What's a Tank?3s. What are the Armor Sets and what do they do?3t. Where do I get the Blinking Mirror?3u. No offense, but can you suggest another Walkthrough?

4. Walkthrough4a. Introduction4b. Hugo Chapter 14c. Chris Chapter 14d. Geddoe Chapter 14e. Break--Time to Decide about Thomas4f. Chris Chapter 24g. Hugo Chapter 2

4h. Geddoe Chapter 24i. Geddoe Chapter 34j. Hugo Chapter 34k. Chris Chapter 34l. Thomas Chapter 1 (Optional)4m. Thomas Chapter 2 (Optional)4n. Interlude--The Big Question (Spoilers)4o. Chapter 44p. Chapter 5


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----------------------------------------Part II: Reference Guide (Spoilers)

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5. 108 Stars of Destiny Recruit List

6. My Really Important Items List6a. Introduction6b. Runes6c. Armor6d. Hammers6e. Medal Sets6f. Accessories6g. Scripts

7. Duels

8. Ernie's Quiz

9. Boss/Battle Strategies

----------------------------------------Part III: Secrets (HUGE SPOILERS)----------------------------------------

10. 108 Stars of Destiny Bonus

11. Miscellaneous Q&A's

12. So why did you choose this play and recruiting order?

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Part IV: Thanks and Version History----------------------------------------

13. Acknowledgements

14. Version History

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----------------------------------------Part I: Introduction and Walkthrough

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1. Introduction (How do I find stuff in this document?)

This Walkthrough covers how to get through Suikoden III with detailed contenton how to make the story advance, battle and recruiting strategies, and lots ofother stuff. What it does NOT include are comprehensive lists for the items


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in the game such as recipes, old books, runes, etc. I cover how to get most ofthese items in the Walkthrough with a mini-list of important items, but forcomprehensive lists, I refer you to Ryvius' FAQ here at gamefaqs and to thelists available at suikosource.com.

This document is broken up into four parts. Part I has general questions alongwith the actual Walkthrough. *Please* check the questions in sections 2 and 3before e-mailing me about something.

Part II is the Reference Guide. I put this in mainly for people who have aspecific question about how to recruit someone, how to beat a certain boss, orhow to get an item without having to plow through the Walkthrough. There arespoilers here but only minor ones for sections 5-8. Beyond some very minorstory points and the character names, nothing is revealed. Because section 9details the main boss/strategy battles in the game, key story events ARErevealed in this section. To reduce spoilers, an expanded content list forPart II is not in the main Table of Contents but instead placed at the start ofPart II.

Part III covers the Secrets of the game. Needless to say, the biggest spoilersare in this section. If you really want to know the reasons why I chose theplay and recruiting order of this Walkthrough, check section 12 in this part.

Part IV has the Acknowledgements and Version History sections.

If you want to zip to a part of this document quickly, open it up in WordPad orNotePad+ and make use of the Find tool. Activate both Match whole word andMatch case by checking them. Type in the following keywords in the quote marksthen hit Find Next until you get to each topic. You will have to hit Find Nexta few times before you get to the actual topic content:

"4. Walkthrough" --goes to the actual Walkthrough"5. 108 Stars" --goes to the Recruit List"6. My Really" --goes to the mini-list of Items"7. Duels" --goes to the Duels section"9. Boss/Battle" --goes to boss/strategy battles section"Part III:" --goes to Secrets section

You can do this with any other keyword topic you want such as the name of aparticular rune, character, item, boss, etc. If you'd like to go to a maincharacter's specific chapter, type in the phrase:

"[character name] [chapter] [chapter #]"

To get to Geddoe's chapter 2, for example, you'd type "Geddoe chapter 2" thenhit Find Next until you got to the actual content. Using the Find Tool is alot better than scrolling with your mouse or using the Page Up/Down keys.

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*******************************************************************************2. Top 10 e-Mail Questions

2a. What do I get for loading Suikoden II data?

The only things you get for loading Suikoden II data into Suikoden III are twoextra scripts (with plays related to events in Suikoden I and II), boostedlevels for three characters, and references to the names you gave to the heroesand armies of the previous games. The Suikoden II data you load must be a savegame after defeating the final boss in that game. To load Suikoden II data,


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insert the PSOne memory card with the data into one of the slots in your PS2with a PS2 memory card in the other slot. Access the PS2 browser and copy theSuikoden II data from the PSOne memory card to the PS2 memory card. At thestart of Suikoden III you will be prompted to load Suikoden II data and can doso at that time. I have written this walkthrough to include the minordifferences if you did or did not load Suikoden II data.

Suikoden II data that meets the requirements for Suikoden III is available fordownload via the DexDrive at gamefaqs. Go to the PSOne/PSX section, then toSuikoden II, then Game Saves. The Game Save by CDexter will enable you to getthe Scripts, which is the biggest reason to load Suikoden II data, really.Download this file to your hard drive, then copy it to a PSOne memory card viathe DexDrive. AFAIK, the DexDrives for the PSOne and PS2 are NOT compatible.If you have to spend more than $5 on this endeavor (in terms of getting a PSOneMemory Card and PSOne DexDrive), it's not worth it, IMO.

Thanks to CDexter for providing the Suikoden II game save.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2b. Should I play Suikoden I and II first?

Suikoden III can be enjoyed as a standalone game-its story and characters haveonly very minor ties to the previous two games. I suggest you play Suikoden Iand II moreso because they are great games (better than Suikoden III, IMHO)

rather than as an issue of continuity. Blue Moon's web site, suikosource.com,has story summaries of the first two games if you're interested.

In terms of acquiring the old games, your best bet is the bargain bin/usedsection of a local retailer. A couple of friends of mine have been able to getthe old games by asking their local store to hold on to a copy if someonetrades it in. Your other avenue is ebay or half.com, but I imagine because oftheir scarcity you'll have to pay more than the original price.

nihon e-mailed me about a site called gametz.com where you may also be able toget a copy of Suikoden I and II. I don't know too much about this site norhave I ever tried it, but I am including it for those who'd like to look intoit further. In no way am I endorsing gametz.com or suggesting you go there-I'm

putting it in here mainly because 1/3 of the e-mails I get are related to howsomeone can get a hold of the older games outside of ebay or half.com. Use itat your own risk. Thanks to nihon for providing info. about gametz.com.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2c. How long does this game take to complete?

If you blew through the game with the sole intent of beating it, probably 40hours or so. If you take the time to do all the mini-games, level up, get allthe recruits, etc., it will take at least 60 hours I believe. I wrote thisWalkthrough as I was playing the game and it took me 52 hours. Keep in mindthat this was my fourth play through so I knew ahead of time where everythingwas, how to get set up for battles, and so forth.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2d. All about recruiting

A major gameplay/story device for Suikoden III is the 108 Stars of Destiny.These are the main figures of the story who determine the ultimate course ofhistory and the world's fate. Over the course of the game, you will have thechance to gather all 108 Stars with your main characters. The 108 Stars canbe separated into two groups, Automatic Stars and Non-Automatic Stars. As youwould guess, the Automatic Stars are the recruits who will join you for story


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reasons so you won't have to do anything special to get them. The Non-Automatic Stars will need to be recruited with some effort and it's possibleyou can miss out on getting them.

To start recruiting any of the non-automatic stars, you need to visit LakeCastle first. Therefore, Geddoe can start recruiting in his chapter 1, Chriscan start recruiting in her chapter 2, and Hugo can recruit starting in hischapter 3. Hugo can technically get 1 recruit in his chapter 2 but for allintents and purposes, chapter 3 is when he can really start to recruit.Thanks to SimUser for providing info. on when Hugo can start recruiting.

If you want to get all the Stars of Destiny without having to check this guidefurther, recruit Kidd and make use of his Scout option. Kidd will gatherdetailed information for you on how to get all the possible Stars. It's how Iwas able to figure out how to recruit everyone on my own.

An important thing to keep in mind is that you can only use characters with theperson who recruited them until ch. 4. That is, if you recruit someone inGeddoe's chapter 1, only Geddoe can put that character into his party untilch. 4. Chris and Hugo will not have access to that recruit until then. Ifa recruit is someone who runs a shop, the other characters can still visitthem at their shop but they cannot put them in their party.

You can recruit all the way up until the very last boss battle in ch. 5. There

is also no restriction on who can recruit who-I suggest a recruiting order inthe actual Walkthrough but there's no one that can't be recruited by Chris,Hugo, or Geddoe. If you can't recruit someone because they're either not thereor they're not giving you the option to recruit, just try again in a laterchapter. Some non-automatic stars will not show up or join until you havegathered a certain number of recruits (similar to Bob in Suikoden II).

The level of the non-automatic stars is either preset or it's dependent on thelevel of the person recruiting them. Mel, for example, will always be atlevel 32 when you recruit her. Sanae Y, on the other hand, will be 1 levellower than whoever recruited her. To avoid too many spoilers, I've put acomplete list of which category the non-automatic stars fall under in section5e.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2e. What skills should my characters learn?

I'm reluctant to answer this since a lot of the fun from the game involvescustomizing your roster the way you see fit through the skills system. I willgo ahead and make a few comments on it, though. A good "default" skill,meaning if you don't have any real preference for anything, in the earlychapters is Accuracy. This is because the SKL stat of your characters is lowat the start and they'll have a hard time hitting enemies with good Repelrates, especially the Golem bosses. Later on, this skill isn't real necessaryfor characters with SKL stats topping 125. For the later chapters, two gooddefault skills are Armor Protect and Magic Resistance. This mainly applies for

strategy and boss battles.

The best advice I can give you is just to try everything. You'll have a greatopportunity for this in chapters 4 and 5. A good method for experimenting isto gather skill points for your characters then saving before visiting theTutor or bujutsu teacher. Add some skills you want to try out and if you likethem, keep them. If not, just reload and try something else out. The gamebalances it out so you can never have uberwarriors like McDohl from the firsttwo Suikodens. However, with the skills system there's no one in the game youcan't make strong enough to deserve a spot in your regular party.


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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2f. Why do you recommend doing...?

If I don't clearly state why I suggest you do something, it's for spoilerreasons. I say it a bunch of times in this Walkthrough but it's worth it-allmy suggestions are just that. If you've found a better way or rather do ita different way than I recommend, by all means, do so. If you'd really like toknow the reason behind a recommendation and don't mind being spoiled about it,feel free to e-mail me and please be as specific as possible.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2g. Agh! I can't get [Recruit/Item] and I'm going to smash my PS2!

This game can certainly cause a lot of frustration in terms of a few recruitsand rare items you try to pick up. I don't compare it on the level of some ofthe extras in the Final Fantasy series (dodging 200 lightning bolts, anyone?)but you may hit some rough patches to be sure. Keep in mind that in MOST casesyou can come back to getting a recruit or an item in a later part of the game.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2h. Why can't I go to chapter 4?

In order to proceed to chapter 4, you must complete Geddoe, Chris, and Hugo's

chapter 3's first. Thomas' chapters are completely optional and you do nothave to play his story to complete the game. If you want to play Thomas'story, you must do so before advancing to chapter 4.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2i. Why aren't the lottery results switching like you said?

The way I suggest to play the lottery is:

-Buy 10 tickets, 5 sequential and 5 random-Kill 20-30 minutes of real time by doing random battles, story events, etc.-Come back to the town with the lottery and SAVE your game-Check the lottery board

-If the results aren't up yet, go back out and kill 5 minutes then come back,SAVE again, then check the results. Keep repeating this until the results areposted-If you did not get the results you wanted, soft reset by pressing the shoulderbuttons plus Start & Select then check the results again. Keep soft resettinguntil you get the desired results

The lottery results are totally random until:

-You check the board-You talk to the lottery seller, who tells you "Current winning numbers are up"

The numbers will also be set if:

-You waited until the next chapter to check the results-You waited TWO more lottery periods to check your tickets (i.e. you boughttickets for lottery period #1 but don't check until lottery #3 is already up)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------2j. Where can I get a Statue S?

If you fight the treasure bosses in each character's chapter, eventually youwill get items that are marked ?Statue and ?Figurine. These items need to be


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appraised to find out what they actually are. You can get items appraised byvisiting Appraisal Shops located at Vinay del Zexay, Duck Village, Chisha, andIksay. Once you recruit the Appraiser you can visit him at Lake Castle to getthis done as well.

I've been able to confirm two guaranteed Statue S from treasure bosses:

-?Statue from first OR second battle with Mt. Path treasure boss, Hex Doll S-?Statue from first OR second battle with Sindar Ruins treasure boss, usuallythe second time, Dragon Statue S

You can also get a Knight Statue S and a Goddess Statue S by fighting all thepossible treasure bosses at least once during each main characters' chapters.In addition, you can get a Hex Doll S as a random prize for winning Kathy'sraces. The winning times for each of her races are:

No obstacles: 49-50 secs, default prize is Deer Antler (49.677)Some obstacles: 49-51 secs, default prize is Mini-Cactus (49.853)Lots of obstacles: 49-52 secs, default prize is Mini-Cactus (49.677)

These are just estimates based on my experience. The times in parentheses aremy personal bests. Start with the no obstacles course and work your way up.The only strategy I can really give you is to stay to the inside of the trackand don't take really wide turns. Lame advice, I know, but that's all there

really is to it.

Note that if you use Hugo to run these races and Fubar is in your party, Hugowill race with Fubar instead of a horse. The times and prizes I mention areonly with the horse, not Fubar. To race Hugo without Fubar, just take Fubarout of your active party. If you keep getting the default prize more thantwice in a row, then you've exhausted the prizes for that course so try thenext one higher up. You will eventually get a Hex Doll S in one of the threeraces.

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3. General Questions

3a. Introduction

This section covers aspects of game play that include and go beyond what's inthe instruction manual as well as some general questions you may have. Ifinformation on a topic is readily available in the instruction manual, I willnot cover it. If you're renting this game or borrowing it and don't have themanual, you'll still be able to complete the game fine with this walkthrough.The information below is really just supplementary content. If you feel likeyou already have a good grasp of the game mechanics, just skip ahead to thewalkthrough.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3b. The Trinity Sight System

Suikoden III employs a gameplay device called the Trinity Sight System. Thissimply means that the overall story is played through the perspective ofseveral different characters. At the start of the game, you can elect tochoose the perspective of Hugo, Chris, or Geddoe. After completing a chapter,you can continue with that character or switch to somebody else. That is, youcould choose to do Hugo's chapter 1-3 or alternate chapter 1's or go back andforth. This Walkthrough is written as a first play through and goes the route


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of alternating characters from one chapter to the next.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3c. Why this order of play?

The order of play I have used for this walkthrough is meant for players who areplaying the game for the first time. This order gives the player the chance tosee as much of the story as possible while being given options for duels anddialogue choices. Thomas' chapters are entirely optional and something of anacquired taste. I have put his chapters at the end in case the reader triesout his scenario and doesn't care for it. Parts of his story WILL be revealedin the other main characters' stories so if you're the type that hates anyspoilers at all, you should play his chapter 1 after completing Geddoe'schapter 1. I have written the walkthrough with this option in mind. Iactually think people will want to play his chapters more after going throughthe suggested order because the events pique their curiosity.

I highly recommend that if you've already played through the game to play eachcharacter's story in blocks (1-3 consecutively for each) the second timearound. Doing it this way gives you a much better feel for each individualcharacter and you may be surprised how your opinion of them can change by doingit this way.

The Trinity Sight System also lends itself to built-in difficulty levels. In

this way, Chris is the "Easy" mode, Hugo "Medium", and Geddoe "Hard". I'veused this order for the walkthrough with players who are either new to theseries or new to RPG's in general in mind.

If you want to know my personal opinion of the super-duper, all story, mostminimal spoilers order of play, it would be:

Hugo 1Chris 1Geddoe 1Thomas 1Chris 2Hugo 2

Geddoe 2Hugo 3Thomas 2Geddoe 3Chris 3Chapter 4Chapter 5

I gave it a lot of thought before deciding the Walkthrough's order and havechosen the one in section 4. If you're _really_ curious as to know why Ichose the play/recruiting order for the Walkthrough, go to section 12. Bewarned that it does contain some spoilers, including a really big one. Theexplanation is meant for people who are at least on chapter 5 already.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3d. Skills/Stats

Skills and stats are essential to winning the game so I'm going to take sometime to discuss them in detail. Skills are abilities that provide specificbenefits for each character. No character has access to all the skills in thegame and some characters can acquire only a few of them. Stats are the numericmeasure of the 8 general abilities every character possesses. You can view acharacter's skills and their stats by choosing the status option from the main


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options menu.

You can raise a character's stats through two ways-by using Stones that booststats (usually by 1-3 points) or the more common way by winning battles to getexperience and raising your level. Every time your characters go up a levelthey will get an increase to their stats. The amount of experience you gainper encounter is based on a comparison between your level and the level of themonster you are fighting, without taking the number of party members intoaccount. An example:

You have a party of 4, 3 of them are at level 27 and the other is at level 60.You face the monster Copper Sun, whose level is 54, and win. The 3 charactersat level 27 get a few thousand experience points and gain 4 levels each to getto level 31. Your level 60 character, however, gets only a handful ofexperience points. Note that you can't see a monster's level (or any of theirother stats for that matter). The way the AI computes how many experiencepoints you get _is_ based on this type of formula, though. I have no idea ifthe Copper Sun's level is really 54, but based on how much experience you getfor him, the above example is an accurate analogy. The amount of experienceand how they're distributed is the same regardless of how many people you hadin your party.

Skills work a little differently. Each skill that a character can acquire haslevels that tell you how good they are in that skill. These levels are noted

by a simple grading scale that goes from "E" (practically no talent in thatskill) to "S" (godlike with that skill). The only way to raise skill levels isby acquiring skill points then visiting a bujutsu teacher or Tutor to raise thelevels. A character's ability to activate the skill as well as how powerfulthe skill is depends on their grade level.

For example, let's say you have a character with the skill Lightning Magic. Acharacter whose rank is a "B" will take about a turn and a half to cast theSoaring Bolt spell which will do about 900 points of damage. A character withsimilar stats but who has an "A+" in Lightning Magic casting the same spellwill only take a half a turn to get the spell off and will do about 1400 pointsof damage.

Another example is if a character has the ability Adrenaline Power. When acharacter's Hit Points reach 0, this skill will bring them back to life, albeitwith only a few Hit Points. If a character has a "C" in this skill, it willactivate maybe 5-10% of the time. A character who has an "A+" with similarstats will activate this skill closer to 30-50% of the time.

The examples I used are based on experience. Because I don't know the exactformula for calculating the differences in letter grades, the numbers I usedin the examples are meant only as a general guide. I _have_ noticed verydramatic differences between the higher level grades. That is, there's a bigimprovement between going from an "A" to an "A+" and going from an "A+" to an"S". Certain skills are also affected by the general stats, such as Swingbeing influenced by a character's SPD.

There are two types of skills in the game: physical and magical. Physicalskills are learned and improved by visiting a bujutsu teacher. Magical skillsare likewise the domain of tutors. There are certain skills that everycharacter can learn. Conversely, there are some skills that are available onlyto specific characters. In addition, each character has a natural terminalgrade they can achieve in each skill. Lastly, each character has a speedmeasuring how quickly they can move up in skill level. Let's take an exampleto make sense of this:


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Hugo comes with the abilities Swing and Heavy Damage. The Swing ability can belearned by any of the characters in the game by going to a bujutsu teacher. Onthe other hand, the Heavy Damage skill cannot be learned by every one and isactivated when a character reaches a certain experience level. Hugo comes withit automatically but he has not yet reached the level necessary to activateanother skill, Continual Attack. Hugo's Swing ability naturally tops out at an"A". Because this is a pretty good match for him, he will need to investaround 750 skill points to reach that "A" level from his starting "E" level.

When you visit a bujutsu teacher or tutor, you can select the "Test" option.This will give you a general idea of the terminal grade and speed of learningfor a character's skill level. The comments and what they mean:

-Perfect Match! = S-Fairly Good Match = A to A+-Natural Ability Exists = B+-Average = B-It Will Take Time = C

I stress the words "general idea"-some characters who test at "Perfect Match!"will only go up to a B+ and others who test at "It Will Take Time" can go up toan A+. The vast majority of the time, however, the test results coincide withthe guide above.

As far as acquiring skill points, each monster you encounter has a set amountof skill points that they are worth. After winning a battle, these skillpoints are divided up among the surviving party members, regardless of yourexperience level. An example to illustrate:

You have a party of 4 and you face the Twin-Head Snake boss, who is worth 800skill points. You defeat it but 2 of your members got knocked out and areunconscious when you win. The 2 conscious party members each get 400 skillpoints. If you had been able to win with all 4 party members still conscious,each member would've gotten 200 skill points. The amount of skill points andhow they are distributed is the same no matter if you were at level 30 when youwon or if you were at level 60.

The instruction manual has a detailed list of the skills and what they do. Forthe purpose of this walkthrough, I will suggest certain skills to learn as wellas point out some other character-specific comments but that's the extent ofit. Because the general stats aren't described in the instruction manual, Ihave listed them below and what they mean:

-PWR (Power): Measures how much damage you give for a successful melee attack.

-SKL (Skill): Measures a character's ability to get past an enemy's defensesto land a successful attack. Goes hand in hand with the Accuracy skill.

-MGC (Magic): Primarily measures the number of spells per level and how higha level of spell a character can cast. For example, the character below on

the left has a MGC stat of 84 and the character on the right has a stat of152, both are equipped with a Lightning Rune and neither has any skill inLightning Magic. You can see the difference in the number of spells per leveleach can cast and that the character with the higher MGC stat has access to the4th level spell.

Character A: Character B:

Level 1 6 9Level 2 3 6


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Level 3 1 3Level 4 0 1

The skills for specific magic, like Fire Magic and Water Magic skill, primarilymeasure how fast a spell is cast and how much damage it will do.

-REP (Repel): Measures a character's natural evade ability to avoid enemymelee attacks. Goes with the Repel skill.

-PDF (Physical Defense): Determines how much damage a character will receivewhen an enemy lands a successful melee attack. Monster characters like Fubarwill have a natural PDF rating since they can't wear armor. Everyone else'sPDF starts at 0 because this is determined by what armor and accessories theyare wearing. The skills Armor Protect and Shield Protect will enhance PDF.Note that some characters can get much more mileage out of armor than others.

-MDF (Magic Defense): Determines how much damage a character will receive whenan enemy lands a successful magic attack. The skills Magic Resistance andMagic Repel can enhance MDF.

-SPD (Speed): This influences how many physical actions a character canperform during their turn, specifically running and attacking. A characterwith good speed can run up to an enemy far away and still get off their normalnumber of attacks. Others who are slow will have a hard time just getting into

position to attack or delivering their usual number of hits. The skills HolyDash and Swing can augment speedy characters and aid slower ones.

-LUK (Luck): Not too sure about this because it's a stat that I haven't paidmuch attention to. Piccolo mentions in the game that characters with low lucktend to be targeted first by the enemy but I haven't seen enough evidence tosuggest this is definitely true.

You do not acquire skill points through strategy battles, only through theregular field battles in boss fights and random encounters. With the exceptionof one unique strategy battle, this is also true for experience points. Interms of what's more important, skills or stats, my own experience clearlypoints to skills. Using the stat stones trick (described below in part 3n.),

I boosted Chris' REP stat up to 503, with her Repel skill at a "B". In aa series of battles, the enemy was still able to hit her a few times. On theother hand, Hugo had a REP stat of 169 with a Repel skill at "A+" and he didn'tget hit once in those same battles. This is just one example, I know, but I'mvery confident that if you have a level 60 character with great stats and onlymediocre skill levels, they're likely to be on par with or below a level 45character with outstanding skill levels.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3e. Support Characters

These are characters who are in your party but do not show up on screen whenyou have a random encounter or run into a boss fight. The instruction manual

provides detailed descriptions of the support skills and what they do so I'mnot going to cover them here. Note that some characters that are active duringthe regular battles, such as Juan and Ace, also have support skills. While allsupport skills provide some benefit, others can also be accessed directly to beused just like their equivalents at a shop.

For example, Jeane has the Rune Sage support skill. This benefits spellcasting during battles. In addition to this, if you access this skill throughthe skills option, you can remove and affix runes on your characters just likeyou would at a Rune Shop. Similarly, Juan has the Bujutsu Teacher support


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skill. By accessing this skill, you can test, forget, and get lessons anywhereat any time as long as Juan is in your party. There is no way to boost theskill level of characters who are only support characters. There's only oneinstance I know of where you can boost the support skill of one of the regularcharacters, which is Sanae Y's Healing support skill through one of Jefferson'sappointments.

The effects of support skills are not cumulative. For example, Ace and Marthaboth have the Discount support skills. You can have both of them in your partyat the same time but only the person with the higher grade in the support skill(in this case Martha) will have any effect.

For those characters who have either the Tutor or Bujutsu Teacher supportskill, the grades for these abilities only affect battle encounters. That is,regardless of the grade, if you access these skills to Learn, Forget, or Testskills it's all the same. For example, Ernie has a higher grade in Tutor thanNadir. If you have her in your party during random battles, she does a betterjob of aiding your magic attacks than Nadir. However, if you were to accessthe Tutor skill from the main Skills option, their abilities in Lesson, Forget,and Test are completely the same-you would not have to invest more skill pointsto learn a skill from Nadir than you would from Ernie or anything else relatedto skills.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

3f. Runes and Magic

All magical ability in Suikoden III revolves around runes. Basically, magicalpower is stored in rune crystals. Rune sages can unseal the crystals andembed characters with the runes inside and the magical properties that comewith them. A description of 12 of the major runes in the game is included inthe instruction manual. I will note the relevant runes as they come up duringthe course of the walkthrough. As a general rule, I'm heavily biased againstusing Fire and Earth Magic. The first because it has a tendency to hit yourown party members and the latter because it's virtually useless until very latein the game.

The only way to replenish your spells is by resting at an Inn and when story

elements dictate (usually when a chapter turns over).

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3g. Battle Formation/The Pairs System

When you access the formation screen from the main options menu, it shows 7slots like this:

------------

(Pair 1, bottom left on battle screen)------------

(Pair 2, middle on the battle screen)------------

(Pair 3, top right on battle screen)------(Support Character)

You can have up to six party members in your group plus one support person.The pairs system means that during a random encounter or boss battle, you willgive only 3 commands for all six characters. You never give commands during a


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battle to support characters. Item use is restricted to each individual pair.That is, someone in Pair 1 can never use Medicine or a similar item on someonewho is in Pair 2 or 3. This also dictates that it's a bad idea to pair 2magic users together. Since you can only give one command to both of them perturn, you negate their ability to both cast spells during the same turn.

By pairing certain characters together, you can access combos. These combosrange from the 2-person variety all the way to combos that involve up to 5characters. In addition, you can pair 3 characters with their mounts in orderto form a mounted unit. To not spoil anything, I will mention these charactersin turn during the course of the walkthrough.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3h. Strategy Battles

These battles represent confrontations between entire armies rather than therandom/boss battles involving small groups. Strategy battles are initiatedonly by the story, meaning there are no "random" strategy battles in the game.Each strategy battle has a specific goal given to you, such as staying alivefor [X] amount of turns or defeating a certain enemy unit. Depending on howwell you did in accomplishing the given goal, you may receive loot afterwards.You do not receive skill points for fighting these battles. With the exceptionof the first strategy battle in Chris' chapter 1 (which involves the level 99trick), you do not gain experience or levels either.

The most important thing to note about these strategy battles is that certaincharacters can die permanently in them. The way you can tell if someone hasdied forever is if they meet ALL the following criteria:

-They are not a unit leader-Their HP are reduced to 0 _and_ the unit leader's HP were reduced to 0 inthe same field battle-They have a dialogue box after the battle and say something. This comes afterthe unit leader's dialogue box which always pops up if a unit is defeated

If a character dies permanently in these strategy battles, you will not receivethe 108 Stars of Destiny bonus at the end of the game and you can't use them in

your party again. One of the options for the formation setup screen, which Idiscuss in detail later in this section, is Story VIPs. To see if someone isvulnerable to dying permanently in battle, select this option then Confirm.The characters that get switched into the Reserve boxes are the ones that candie forever in the strategy battles. Note that the Story VIPs can change frombattle to battle.

The actual gameplay for these battles is highly simplified. The battlefield isrepresented by a group of circles connected together by dotted lines. Thestarting position of your Army units and the enemy's is preset before eachbattle. Actions are turn-based, meaning you will do everything you want withyour units then end your turn then the AI will do the same. You can only give1 command to each unit per turn. When a unit is moved into a circle occupied

by an opposing unit, a field battle will commence. The field battle screen isthe same as those for random/boss battles, except you only have commands toAttack, Defend, and Retreat. The field battle ends if 1 of the 3 occurs:

1. A unit leader's HP is reduced to 0 or2. A unit chooses the retreat option or3. Three turns elapse and 1 or 2 did not occur

From the main battlefield screen, you will have the option to Move (the Bootsymbol), Defend (the Shield symbol), or use a Special Skill (the Lightning Bolt


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symbol). Moving is self-explanatory. Choosing Defend will reduce a unit'sdamage taken by 1/2 if they're attacked and get into a field battle. Specialskills are various offensive and defensive abilities that affect entire units.Certain characters on your roster possess these skills. The most notableSpecial Skills are:

-Lightning. Reduces each member of a target unit's HP by 1/3. Affects onlyone individual unit and has a range of two connected circles.-Fire. Reduces each member of a target unit's HP by 1/5. Affects ALL units inthe target circle and has a range of one connected circle.-Water. Heals all of a unit's HP and has a range of one connected circle.-Heal. Heals 1/2 of each member's HP in the target unit. Can only be cast ona unit in the same circle.

Some battlefield circles also have effects. To check what these effects maybe, move the pointer over a circle. Some Plains circles, for examples, healthe HP of an occupying unit. You can view what comprises an enemy unit byplacing the pointer over them and hitting X. If more than one enemy unit isstacked together on the same circle, you can switch to the one you want totarget/view by hitting X then moving the D-Pad left or right.

If you're able to flank an enemy unit, you can put your teams into a Coverposition. When you do this, you bolster the damage down by the attacking unitwho's being covered. The more units covering from different circles, the more

damage. Each cover unit bolsters damage done by about 50%. Putting units intoa Cover position does not influence the Retreat success of the enemy nor doesit bolster your attacking units' defense. In the strategy battles in chapters4 and 5, moving your units into Cover positions can mean the difference betweenVictories and Major Victories.

During the actual field battle, you have three available commands: Attack,Defend, and Retreat. If you choose Attack, your unit will do just that.However, you have no control over their actions after that, meaning you can'tchoose who they attack, what type of attack they will use, or anything else.Choosing Defend will boost your characters' defenses as they normally would ina regular battle. Unless your characters are stunned or unbalanced, there isno reason to ever choose the Defend option. Retreat will cause your unit to

leave the field. Most of the time when you do this, the enemy will get a freeturn to attack you. Note that you cannot Retreat if there is no open circle togo to on the main strategy battle screen.

Before most, but not all, strategy battles you will talk to either Salome orCaesar and they will ask you to organize your units. This screen is differentfrom the main formation screen used for regular/boss battles. You will begiven the options of Alter, Auto, Story VIPs, and AllReserve. Alter allows youto swap your characters around. Auto allows the AI to organize your units foryou. NEVER pick this option. Story VIPs will put all characters who can diepermanently in the upcoming strategy battle into reserve to keep them safe.AllReserve will empty all the units out except the unit commanders. A veryimportant thing to remember about organizing your units is that after you tell

Salome or Caesar that you're ready to battle, you cannot go back to change theformation again. As long as you tell them to wait or you're not ready toproceed, you can talk to them again to change the formation.

In terms of individual unit formation, it looks like this:

-------- (Slot 1)-------- (Slot 2)-------- (Slot 3)-------- (Slot 4)


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-------- (Support)

Like in regular/boss battles, the Support character does not show up on thefield battle screen but provides some benefit to the unit. Slot 1 will be atthe front of the unit on the field battle screen and will be the first choiceof an enemy attack. This changes if you have special runes or items thataffect the enemy's choice of target such as Blue Ribbons, Skunk Runes, andFirefly Runes. Slot 4 is usually occupied by the unit leader. The unitleader's position can never be changed. Slots 1 & 2 and slots 3 & 4 areconsidered pairs to a certain extent. No unite attacks or mounted units willbe in effect but how each character reacts will still be dictated by the pairssystem. That is, if you place a Berserker type character who always attacksinto Slot 3, they will drag up the person in Slot 4 with them, just like ifthey're paired in a regular or boss battle.

This watered down version of the pairs system affects your formation choice ina few ways. First, the person in Slot 1 should have good defense and, if atall possible, high attack skills as well. This is because they're usually thefirst person to attack as well as be attacked. If the unit leader is in Slot4, it's a bad idea to put a magic user or archer in Slot 3. This is becausethe enemy always starts far away from you in the field battle and only thefastest unit leaders will be able to drag up the magic user/archer with them.Slot 2 is the best for magic users and archers since it's close enough to theenemy to allow the person in Slot 1 to still attack.

The best way to ensure your success in these strategy battles is to train upand properly equip the characters who will participate in them. It's reallynot more complicated than that until the game's last strategy battle.Strategies are provided for each of the battles in the Walkthrough itself andin section 9.

The most useful items for strategy battles are Sacrificial Jizos, FireflyRunes, Skunk Runes, and Haziness Runes. Sacrificial Jizos need to be equippedin a character's personal inventory. They essentially add 1/3 of the wearer'sHP to their total HP. For example, a character with 300 HP wearing aSacrificial Jizo would really have 400 HP. When a character's HP are reducedto 0, the Jizo will activate and restore that 1/3 of HP back. However, if a

character receives a damage amount that exceeds what the Jizo can provide, theywill still get knocked out. To take the above example further, let's say thewearer is down to 100 HP. They get hit for 400 HP of damage--200 HP more thanwhat the Jizo provides for. They would then get knocked out. However, if theygot hit for exactly 200 HP, they would get 100 HP back and not get knocked out.This is not the exact formula for Jizos, but it is an accurate analogy. Jizosare active during strategy battles and you can equip up to three of them on oneperson.

Firefly Runes make the wearer the first choice of an enemy attack. This isinvaluable when placed on a Tank (characters who receive very little damagefrom melee attacks). Because most of the field battles involve melee attacks,the enemy will go after the Tank first and ignore everyone else, even if the

rest of the Tank's unit is ripping them to shreds. You can recruit someone whohas a removable Firefly Rune. In Thomas' chapters 1 and 2, the Purple Creepersin the North Cavern drop them.

Skunk Runes are the opposite of Firefly Runes. The wearer is the last choiceof an enemy melee attack. This is not a 100% guarantee, though. I have foundthat it's fairly effective but I highly recommend that you don't take theapproach of equipping everyone except a Tank with a Skunk Rune. I just haven'tseen this work consistently enough. It is a good choice for more vulnerablecharacters, though. Skunk Runes can be bought at the Duck Village Rune Shop


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from chapter 3 onward. Blue Ribbons are an accessory that function like SkunkRunes but have a higher rate of success. Only females can wear them. They area Rarity at the Duck Village Item Shop from chapter 3 onward.

Haziness Runes improve the wearer's chances of evading an enemy melee attack.I've probably fought around 50 strategy battles and these Runes activate quiteoften, probably around 1/4 to 1/3 of the time. Best used for characters withlow HP or bad defense but who are really good attackers. It seems to activatemore often for characters with good Repel, Armor Protect, Shield Protect, andParry skills. They are a Rarity at the Duck Village and Le Buque Item Storesfrom chapter 3 onward.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3i. Duels

Duels are one-on-one contests where you are given 3 options: Defend, Attack,or Deathblow. It's a rock-paper-scissors type battle with an advantage meterthrown in. Basically:

When your Enemy does: You Should:

Attack DeathblowDefend AttackDeathblow Defend

You'll note a small green circle at the bottom near the duel gauge. Thisindicates a DISadvantage. That means if the circle is under your character'sportrait, your enemy has the upper hand. In this case, the usual rules abovewill be bent somewhat in favor of the person with the advantage. For example,normally if you Deathblow when your enemy Attacks, you take no damage. On theother hand, if they have the advantage, they will still get in an Attack andcause you damage. Therefore, if the advantage is totally in your favor, youhave some leeway to make a mistake and not pay for it. It works the other wayas well.

An important thing to remember about duels is that some Runes that affect yourstatus will be in effect when you duel. This can be good in the case if you

have something like a Fury Rune or very bad if you forgot to remove thatHunter Rune you were messing around with. I've covered every winnable duel inthe game to let you know what your enemy's comments mean so you can counteraccordingly. I probably have missed a few of the comments but have suppliedmore than enough so you can win every duel.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3j. Character Types

Each character has a personality "type" that describes their tendency inbattle. The manual describes these tendencies on page 24. The vast majorityof your non-support characters are Offensive Fighters. The two classes to noteare Berserkers and Magic Users. Berserkers will always attack even if you give

them the Defend command. Magic Users are the opposite--they almost never do amelee attack even if you give them the Attack command. This is especially truefor Magic Users if they're paired with someone else. To avoid spoilers, I havenoted which characters are Berserkers and Magic Users in the 108 Stars ofDestiny section. When I make suggestions for formations in the walkthrough, Itake the various character types into account.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3k. Treasure bosses


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During the course of the game, you will run into monsters that are guardingtreasure chests. Each of these treasure bosses are located in a specific areaand by the end of the game there are 6 of them in all. When you defeat theboss, there's usually around 2-24 items in the chest plus a nice cash reward.If you loot the entire contents of a chest, that treasure boss will re-spawnafter about 30-45 minutes, with more loot in the chest and more cash. If youdon't loot all the contents, it will take _much_ longer for the treasure boss(and his treasure) to re-appear, usually at least a few hours. There arebenefits to doing one or the other depending on whether or not you want tokeep fighting a certain boss.

The location of the treasure bosses and the earliest chapter they appear foreach character in parentheses:

1. Mt. Hei-Tou, Geddoe (1), Chris (2), Hugo (3)2. North Cavern, Geddoe (2), Chris (2), Hugo (3), Thomas (1)3. Mt. Path, Geddoe (1), Chris (3), Hugo (3)4. Mt. Senai, Geddoe (2), Chris (4), Hugo (4)5. Hideaway, All (3)6. Cyndar Ruins, All (5)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3l. Recipes, Old Books, Medal Sets, Antiques, Bath Items, and Scripts

-Once you recruit the chef character in the game, you can give this person theRecipes you find from corpses, treasure bosses, and lottery prizes. With theserecipes and the right spices, you can put together usable food items that healHit Points as well as put your character into various states.

-Once you get the librarian character, you can give them Old Books and readthem. The Old Books contain various information such as a bestiary, listingwhere to find rare items, histories on the Suikoden world, and so forth.

-Once you get the Appointer, you can give him Medal Sets. These Sets containTitles (like "Top Commander") that give boosts to your characters' skills suchas Accuracy, Swing, etc.

-Antiques include Paintings, Statues (big and small), and Figurines such asvases and urns. You can place all these items for display at Lake Castle. Toplace a Painting, walk up to an empty picture frame and hit X. To displayStatues, go up the stairs to the 2nd floor and go to the first room on theleft. This is the statue room with several pedestals where you can place theStatues. For Figurines, walk up to any of the desks inside the Castle and hitX to display them. Most of the time when you first get an antique, it willhave a ? symbol next to it, meaning it needs to be identified first. Take theitem to an appraiser shop and they will identify it for you.

-Once you get the bath character, you can take a soak in the bath house at LakeCastle. If you equip your character with a bath item, you will see differenteffects while in the bath house.

-Once you get the theater director, you can put on plays at Lake Castle. Thedirector comes with one script but you can find others to give him to performdifferent plays.

As I stated earlier, this walkthrough isn't intended to grab all these items.I haven't included it because Ryvius' FAQ here on gamefaqs covers it quitecomprehensively. During the course of the walkthrough, you will get most ofthe items but I don't make it a point to get _all_ of them.


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-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3m. What's the Chris Level 99 trick? Should I do it?

This trick was first posted by Blue Moon at his site, suikosource.com. Manythanks to him for graciously permitting me to include it in this Walkthroughwith some of my own additions.

As the question title suggests, this is a gameplay trick that allows the playerto get Chris up to level 99. Like past Suikoden games, the ceiling experiencelevel is around 60 for Suikoden III. That is, when you reach level 60 you'llonly gain a few experience points for even the toughest random battles. As forthe trick itself, there's a battle that Chris can win in her chapter 1 thatgives her a boost of 2 experience levels every time she wins it. This boost isstill given even at the highest levels so it overcomes the ceiling problem forher.

In terms of should or should you not do it, here's some pros and cons:

Pros:-----

1. Allows you to get up to 16 characters at level 99 or very close to it2. Along with #1, this means you get to see these characters at their maxed

out stat levels. One big benefit of this is that Chris will be able to

cast level 4 spells3. Makes most strategy battles ridiculously easy4. You can breeze through Chris' chapters in terms of random battles as well

because she can win most of them outright or Let Go of them

Cons:-----

1. Removes a lot of the challenge out of the game2. Takes a good 12-20 hours to complete3. Is extremely tedious, as you'll be viewing the same cutscene and fighting

the same battles ad nauseum4. It's difficult at the outset to do and the frustration level can be very

high, especially watching the AI cost you the win over and over again bycontrolling your units in the stupidest ways possible

It's up to you if you want to try it. I'm not one of those people who say thatit's cheating or you're taking advantage of a game loophole. It's YOUR gamethat you paid for so you should play it any way you darn well please. I didn'tdo it until my second playthrough and thought it was worth it because itallowed me to try some things that would not have been possible otherwise. Iwill never do it again though because it's just too tedious and time consuming.You absolutely do NOT need to do it to win any of the battles in the game.Practically all of them are still relatively easy as long you prepare for them.

I cover the trick in-depth below and it does contain some minor story spoilers

for Chris' chapter 1 & 2 so be warned. *Please* read through the whole sectionon how to do the trick before e-mailing me about something. The trick as itwas originally posted by Blue Moon can be found here:

http://suikosource.com/games/gs3/secrets/level.php

Before actually doing the trick in Chris' chapter 1, do these things:

-Get a radio, CD, or MP3 player. You're going to need it later while doing thetrick or there's a good chance you will die from boredom. If you see this


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light and a dead relative beckoning to you, it's time to put down yourcontroller and step slowly away from the console.

-When you get Borus, Salome, and Roland in your party, go to the Vinay delZexay Guild Hall. Upgrade all of your equipment possible, including WingedBoots, Fine Helms, and Fine Casques. Sell any of the old gear you replaced.If they have better Chainmail for Roland, buy that for him, too. RemoveRoland's Great Hawk Rune. Buy a Sacrificial Jizo for everyone but don't equipthem. Leave the Guild Hall and buy 3 Earth Runes at the regular Rune Shop butonly affix one to Salome.

-Exit VdZ and go to Brass Castle. Head east to get a cutscene. After that,go to the east courtyard for another cutscene. Go up to the knights' parlorand talk to Salome. Put Roland and Borus in your party.-Head back to the east courtyard and sharpen their weapons to level 8. If theyhave Flame Amulets at the Item Stand, buy those for Roland and Chris andreplace their Gauntlet/Power Gloves with it. Go to the inn and SAVE.

-Go to Chris' room and tell Louis you want to rest. An extended cutscene willfollow and a strategy battle will commence.

This is it-winning this battle by eliminating all the enemy units will boostChris, Roland, Borus, and Salome's levels by 2 every time. It is next to

impossible to actually win this battle the first time you play it--a reasonablelevel for your characters at this point is level 23. You'll need to be atleast level 32 to win it and I recommend being at level 34. Therefore, thefirst time you get into this battle, just go for the Safe Retreat with thisstrategy:

-During the first turn, move Roland and the other Zexen unit into the samecircle as Chris. End your turn. During the Grasslanders' turn, Lucia andBeecham will show up with some Karaya Units. Salome will then suggest youbreak through. Use Roland's unit to attack the Karayan Unit (Unit #12) that'sblocking your exit. If you didn't win, or somehow lost, send the mounted unit(Unit #4) after them. This should take out the Karayan Unit. Send Chris intothe now empty circle that the Karayans were occupying. Defend with the

remaining Zexen units. The Grasslanders will no doubt attack you in the nextturn. Just pick the retreat option. You'll get attacked most of the time butshould make it into Chris' circle without much problems. When your turn comesup again, move any of the Zexen units into the exit circle (it doesn't have tobe Chris' unit). This will conclude the strategy battle.

You will end up at Plain Amur. Do NOT save on this screen or exit north on themini-map. Stay on this screen and fight the random battles until you get toat least level 32. As I stated earlier, I recommend level 34 at least or evenbetter 35 if you have the patience. This will take you a good few hoursbecause after you reach level 30, the amount of experience points you get willdrop off dramatically. Your best bets for experience are the Dark Hares andthe Troll Dragon rare encounter.

Once you reach the level you want, remove everyone's armor/accessories anddiscard them. Don't worry because you'll be getting it all back soon. Diefrom a random battle. When you get to the Continue screen, choose No Way!You will be back at the Brass Castle inn with your levels and skill pointsintact from the random battles at Plain Amur. Go talk to the Bujutsu Teacherto bump up your skills. The most important to get are Swing for all of themand Armor Protect for Chris and Borus. After that, Accuracy, Heavy Damage, andDamage. NEVER bump up their Repel or Parry skills. Equip the SacrificialJizos you got earlier on them. Affix the Earth runes you got earlier on Chris


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and Roland.

From here on out, you will repeat the following steps until you get to level 99or however high you want to get Chris' level:

-Save at the Brass Castle inn. Talk to Louis and pick Rest.

-When the strategy battle starts, your goal is now to win it. An importantthing to keep in mind is that only Chris has to survive to win. You can loseeveryone else, including Borus, and still get the victory. Also, Chris' unitwill get HP back (about 1/5) for each member of her unit at the start of herturn. Dupa is the most dangerous because of his Fury rune. Removing LuciaASAP is the key to winning. Without her, the enemy can only move 3 units aturn. Because Chris is the most important unit, everyone else is just fodder.

-Here's a diagram for the areas of note:

A-----B/ \ \

/ \ Exit/ \

C ------ D

During your first turn, move Chris and Unit #4 into circle D. Move Roland and

the other Zexen unit into circle A. Use Chris' unit if you get attacked incircle D. During the next turn, send Roland's unit to circle B to clear outthe Karayan unit and send Chris' unit into circle D. Almost always the AIwill use Lucia to meet her. If you were able to take down Lucia, congrats--this battle is now 100x easier.

-Whether or not Lucia went down, your strategy now is to maintain at leastcircles A & B so you'll have a safe place to retreat. Note that you can moveoff circle B once you touch it and it will still count as an occupied circle.

-Once Lucia is gone, the enemy can only move 3 units a turn, making it a loteasier to shuffle your troops around so that Chris can attack and take attacksuntil her HP get low. You can then use another unit to take an attack for her

until she gets HP back at the start of your turn. The first time I won thisbattle, I had to retreat my units all the way to circle B and only Chris wasleft standing at the end.

-Later on when your levels are higher, instead of retreating to circles A & B,take out all the enemy units SE of circle D. By maintaining circles A & D,you put your teams in a Cover position to attack the enemy in circle C.

-If it looks like you definitely won't win, just go for the Safe Retreat again.At Plain Amur, get some more skill points and levels if you didn't already getto level 34. With a Swing grade of B and in the low 30's level, Chris willget two attacks/turn. Getting this is critical to winning the actual strategybattle. Once you get the levels you want at Plain Amur, die again and repeat.

-If you were able to wipe out all the Grasslanders, move any of the survivingunits to the Exit. Your party will chat and you'll get the message thatChris, Borus, Roland, and Salome gained two levels.

-At Plain Amur, discard all their armor and gear. Die in a random battle andrepeat from the top, starting with saving at the inn.

Now for the dying part in detail. Once all their armor is gone, you'll want tofind a random battle with a Wild Boar. Anyone else will take you much longer


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to die, especially once you get to the 50's level or so. I recommend thisformation for your troops:

Chris-----Borus-----RolandSalome

Have Chris and Roland cast the 3rd level Earth Magic spell and have Borus castthe 2nd level Sword of Magic spell. Casting these spells will make your partytotally vulnerable to attacks. For every turn thereafter, choose to recast theEarth spells with Chris and Roland so they start over again--doing this willprevent them from ever getting off their spells and keep them vulnerable. ForBorus, once he runs out of the 2nd level Sword of Magic spell, choose to graban item from the bag. You can do this 3 times if you emptied out his itemslots and have some Medicine in the main inventory. If he's still alive afterdoing that, just have him defend. Once Roland's gone, have Salome cast anyEarth Magic spell that takes more than 1 turn to complete. Keep doing thisuntil everyone dies.

Once you reach higher levels, in the mid-40's or so, the strategy battle can bewon with just Chris. In addition, Borus and Roland will be a big help once

they're leveled up and you can use Roland's unit to help out with the attacks.Also, in the low 60's level, Roland will get 2 attacks a turn if his Swing is aB. At that time, put the Great Hawk Rune back on him.

To see which characters you should recruit with Chris so their levels are alsoaround 99, check section 5e.

There's an alternate way to doing a part of this trick that can save you acouple of hours. The only drawback to this method is that Salome will not goup to level 99 like the others. Instead, he'll be about 12-16 levels lower.To do it this alternate way, the first time you get to Plain Amur (after theSafe Retreat) go up to level 28, which shouldn't take too long by fighting theDark Hares.

Leave Plain Amur and go to Karaya to proceed with the story. Keep progressingwith the story until you end it by going to Chris' house in VdZ. When you getto the Trinity Site, pick Chris' chapter 2. DO NOT SAVE at any time--your lastsave should still be the one at the Brass Castle inn. Keep proceeding withChris' chapter 2 until after the knights have had dinner and Chris gives themtheir new orders. The next day, talk to Salome and choose organize formation.Put Borus and Roland in your party.

Fight random battles at Yaza Plain. In about 15-20 minutes, you'll be at level34. You can spend another 10 minutes out there and get to level 36. Once youreach the level you want, discard all their armor and die. Make sure Borus andRoland are in your party when you die. Select No Way! at the Continue screen

and you'll be back at the Brass Castle inn in chapter 1 with your boostedlevels/skills.

Doing it this way will save you at least an hour or two from leveling all theway up to the mid-30's level at Plain Amur. With this method, from the timeyou get to level 28 at Plain Amur until you die will not take more than anhour and 15 minutes.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3n. What's the stat stones trick?


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This trick takes advantage of the same gameplay mechanism that makes the Chrislevel 99 trick work. Save your game with some Stat Stones in your inventory.Use the Stat Stones to boost some stats. Die, then select No Way! when you'reasked if you want to give up. When you continue from the save point, you willstill have the Stat Stones along with the boosted stats. Keep repeating asmany times as you want. As I mentioned in the Skills/Stats section, it appearsthat Skills are much more important than Stats.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3o. I need money and lots of it!

The best way to earn money early in the game with Hugo, Geddoe, and Thomas isthrough the lottery. Later on, treasure boss monsters are the best way to gofor Geddoe and Hugo. Chris starts with 200,000 potch so money isn't really anissue for her. Later on in the game (chapter 4) you'll have the opportunity toacquire the Prosperity Set, a group of items that includes the Tunic ofProsperity, the Prosperity Hat, and the Prosperity Ring. I have described thismethod in detail in the Walkthrough. Full credit for the Prosperity Set methodgoes to Abraxas from the gamefaqs message board who first posted about it.

As for the lottery, buy 5 Sequential tickets and 5 Random tickets. The lotteryresults turn over every 20-50 minutes of real time. BEFORE checking theresults on the lottery board, save your game. Check the board and if you did

not get the prize you wanted, soft reset by pressing all shoulder buttons alongwith Start and Select. Check the board and keep repeating until you get whatyou want. On average, it takes me 5-10 minutes before getting the 2nd prize(100,000 potch). I've hit the 500,000 prize a few times. I have never hit thegrand prize so I don't know what it is.

sim st-pierre e-mailed me with this helpful tip to get money in chapters 4-5:

"hi, i checked a bit ur walkthrough. i just want to say that when it comes tomoney, there's something really really easy to do. with the trade centers.simply buy a lot of gold bars and pearls. lets say 15 gold bars and 30pearls. gold bars can be bought at caleria and vinay del zexay and pearls atbudehuc and another place. anyway, get as much as u can and go to caleria.(

for the pearls, if u can have the rumor about a town being a seasomething,cant remember, u can get a lot of pearls for less than 10000)

sell all ur gold bar and buy all the pearls at caleria(do the oposite ifgold bars are low, 25000 and below) well when u come back in, lets say, 10minutes, the ones u sold will be pretty low(gold bars are suposed to be15000 and pearls are 13333, depends which u sold) and the other should behigh. anyway i was doing, one time i was selling my gold bar a around 60000and buying the pearls at 13333, and when i come back, i was selling mypearls at 30000 and buying my gold bars at 15000. so with not much time, ucan get a lot of money. if u want u can do the same thing with deer antlers,then are sold a 2500 and bought at 7000-10000.

the trick is that the trade is having a lot of one item so they drop theprice and when its very low u buy it, after it will rise greatly. takes notmuch time for the price to change. so u do something, u teleport to caleria,u buy/sell u come back. takes about 10 minutes for each set of cash. i wasdoing this at the same time i was forging everyone and equiping after. itworks as long as u want, the game is too stupid. (at one point, i had 25gold bars and 40 pearls, i was selling like 23 goldbars and i had 1 millionthis include the rebuy of the pearls. same thing with pearls, selling 35 andhad 1 million with the rebuy of the gold bars.)


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this is the easiest and fastest way i think to make money, because the cardgames sucks. u get the hang of it pretty fast(i had the pearls and gold barsaccumulated since the beginning of the game.)"

Thanks to sim st-pierre for this tip.

The method I have laid out in the Walkthrough is to play the lottery in theearly chapters then get money by way of treasure bosses from chapter 3 onward.With this method, I _never_ had to play Mike at Kabu to get cash.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3p. I was just walking around minding my own business, then the screen

turned yellow and this funny music played and this monster killed me!

Yes, you ran into a rare encounter. On most of the areas where random battlescan occur, there is a monster that will show up about 5-10% of the time. Youcan tell because the screen will fade out in white and yellow before going tothe battle screen. The bad news is that these monsters are usually super toughand can wipe out your entire party pretty easily. The good news is thatthey're worth a ton of skill points and give a nice load of cash. I willmention these as they come up in the Walkthrough section.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3q. Looting corpses

It used to be you got random treasure by finding treasure chests in theSuikoden world but I suppose Konami thought it was unrealistic that shiny metaltreasure boxes were just lying around everywhere. Instead, they've replacedthe treasure chests with corpses you can loot. Amazingly enough, after youloot these corpses someone else will come around and die in the exact samespot, leaving more loot! I like to think they were philanthropists who justcontinue to give from the great beyond.

Most of the time, the first item you can get for looting a corpse is a fixeditem. After that, the item is random. I'm quite sure although not 100% thatthe items you can get rotate after 30-45 minutes. That is, it doesn't worklike the lottery where you can save your game, check the corpse, then re-load

if you didn't get what you want. Instead, the random items that are there justnaturally turn over after a period of time.

Some of the better runes and items you can get will be found as random itemson the corpses, but they're very rare. I will note the good stuff in thecourse of the Walkthrough section. Hugo and Geddoe can loot any time all thetime. Chris takes some time to get over her squeaky clean image and will lootcorpses from her chapter 3 onward. Thomas will never loot corpses but I lovetrying to get him to do it anyway because he says, "What? Oh, cruel world!"which never fails to crack me up (it reminds me of an associate over in theEnglish department).

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

3r. What's a Tank?

The term "Tank" was coined a while ago to describe characters who take verylittle damage from physical attacks. These characters were ideal for puttingon the front line to absorb enemy attacks. In Suikoden III, the value of thesecharacters has been drastically increased because of certain skills and runes.Specifically, the skills Armor Protect, Shield Protect, and Adrenaline Power.The first two skills are self-explanatory and the third automatically revivesa character if their HP go down to 0. Characters like Leo and Fred can go uppretty far with Adrenaline Power and one of Jefferson's appointments will boost


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this grade by two levels.

With regard to runes, Firefly and Double-Strike are of particular note. TheFirefly Rune makes the wearer the first choice of enemy attacks. In strategybattles where most of the attackers do melee damage, a Tank with Firefly cantake all the hits while the rest of your party destroys the enemy. It's thesame in boss battles where the enemy primarily deals melee damage. The Double-Strike Rune multiplies the damage given and received by 2 for the wearer.Because Tank characters receive 0 or 1 damage from physical attacks, this Runeonly benefits them without the inherent penalty from melee damage.

The primary drawback to Tank characters is they generally have horrible magicdefense, and this is true for the most part in Suikoden III. In addition,they generally can't equip more than 1 Rune even at the highest levels (60+).Finally, their speed is usually way below average or just plain average,meaning they will never get more than 1 or 2 attacks per turn. This speedproblem is made worse if your enemy is lined up far away and your charactershave to run a long way to attack them.

To avoid spoilers, I have denoted which characters are Tanks in section 5.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3s. What are the Armor Sets and what do they do?

There are five Armor Sets in Suikoden III. When a complete set is equipped ona character in the active party, it gives certain bonuses. The sets and whatthey do:

-Prosperity Set. Includes Prosperity Hat, Tunic of Prosperity, and ProsperityRing. Money from battles is x7. The Hat is a Rarity at Chisha's Armor Shop.Estella comes with it. The Tunic is a random prize for the 5,000 bet inBilly's card game. The Ring is a Rarity at Chisha's Item Shop. Placingsomeone with the support skill Potch Finder into the party raises the amountof potch received further.

-Destiny Set. Includes Crown of Destiny, Robe of Destiny, and Gloves ofDestiny. Money from battles is x3. The Crown is a Rarity at the Great Hollow

Armor Shop. Estella comes with the Robe. The Gloves are a Rarity at theCaleria Armor Shop. Chris automatically gets them at the end of her chapter2. Placing someone with the support skill Potch Finder into the party raisesthe amount of potch received further.

-Pale Moon Set. Includes Pale Moon Casque, Pale Moon Leather, and Pale MoonNecklace. Adds 25% of melee damage done back to HP. For example, if you hitfor 240 pts. of damage, you get 60 HP back. The Casque is a Rarity at the LeBuque Armor Stand. Landis also comes with it. The Leather is a prize forKathy's races. The Necklace is a Rarity at the Le Buque Item Stand. It canalso be won as a random prize for Kathy's races.

-Guardian Set. Includes the Guardian Casque, Guardian Chainmail, and Guardian

Shield. Boosts Counterattack rate. Yumi and Yuiri come with the Casque. TheChainmail is a Rarity at the Caleria Armor Shop. The Shield is a Rarity atthe Vinay del Zexay Guild Hall Armor Stand. Mua also comes with it.

-Mole Set. Includes the Mole Helm, Mole Armor, Mole Shield, and Mole Gloves.Makes squishy noises when you walk and may boost the occurrence of randombattles (not sure). The Helm is a random item for the Magician treasure bossin Thomas' chapters. It is also a random treasure for the corpse closest tothe Blue Mantrix at Mt. Hei-Tou. The Armor can be bought for 40,000 potchfrom Dominic. The Shield is a Rarity at the Le Buque Armor Stand. Twaikin


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also comes with it. Cecile comes with the Gloves.

Credit and thanks to TexasAndroid who provided most of the content for thissection.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3t. Where do I get the Blinking Mirror?

You can obtain it in chapter 4 after visiting Lake Castle. To avoid spoilers,check the recruit list in section 5c and entries 100 to 101 to find out.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------3u. No offense, but can you suggest another Walkthrough?

No offense taken. To the best of my knowledge, neither Prima nor Brady areplanning an official strategy guide for the US version. The Japanese strategyguide is the only one I know of. In terms of other available resources, I'veheard good things about Ruse's Walkthrough/FAQ here at gamefaqs on the messageboards but I've never checked it out. Ryvius' FAQ also here at gamefaqs isgreat if you want to know where to get items and has a spoiler-free recruitlist. The best internet resource for all things Suikoden is definitely BlueMoon's web site, suikosource.com. The site contains comprehensive lists,story summaries for the games, secrets, links to other useful Suikoden sites,and lots of other goodies.

If you have a quick question, the message boards at gamefaqs and suikosourceare both great resources. Be warned that you may see spoilers in the topicheaders at both places and please avoid doing the same with any questions youmay ask there.

**************************************************************************************************************************************************************4. Walkthrough

4a. Introduction

The Walkthrough is intended mainly to get you through the story with somehelpful suggestions thrown in. If you want to deviate from it to level up,walk around and talk to the townspeople, watch some plays, and so on, by allmeans, do so. I have clearly noted what will make the story advance so if youdon't want to proceed at that time to do something else, go for it. If you'vegot a radio, CD, or MP3 player handy, it makes getting through some of theleveling up/lottery sequences much easier. This is especially true if you'regoing for the Chris Level 99 trick.

In terms of skill selection, I have a tendency to go for physical skills thenhealing magic. I am severely biased against Fire and Earth Magic-the first onebecause it generally will hit your own group and the second because it's onlyuseful in a fight at the very end. I go for physical skills first because your

characters will either be too low of a level to effectively use most offensivemagic or you won't get better magic users until later in the game. The skillssystem is meant so you can customize your characters the way you see fit so theultimate decisions are up to you. When I mention what skills to boost, theyare also just meant as recommendations.

I have denoted when you recruit and how many stars with brackets [ ] at the endof each chapter so as to avoid spoilers before they happen. If a character ismarked with an asterisk (*) it means they are one of the NON-automatic stars.In terms of when you should save, I will mention it at key times but other


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times I leave it up to your common sense. It goes without saying but it's theangriest player who beats the Super-Mega Boss From Hell then the console resetsand 40 hours of game play time are lost forever.

It is always a good idea to fight all the possible treasure bosses in a chapterat least once. To make them re-spawn after 30-45 minutes, loot the entirechest. The only time you don't want them to do that is if you really don'twant to fight them again-leaving some items in the chest will make the bossesre-spawn at a much slower rate (usually a few hours). Fighting treasure bossmonsters is a great way to make a lot of money not to mention getting a nicestash of skill points. In my walkthrough I generally suggest fighting thesebosses at least more than once per chapter.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------4b. Hugo Chapter 1

Pick Hugo's story from the Trinity Site. After the cutscene, pick his storyagain to start playing. When the conversation's done between Hugo, Lulu, andSgt. Joe, I suggest you put and keep your team in this formation:

HugoFubar----------

LuluSgt. Joe(No Support)

Walk to the right of the screen to talk to the man with his arms folded outsideof the hut. This is the bujutsu teacher. Talk to him and select Notes to geta quick primer on how skills work. Select lesson next and raise these skillsfor your characters:

Hugo-Swing up to a D, Accuracy up to a CFubar-Accuracy up to a CLulu-Repel up to a CSgt. Joe-Accuracy up to a C

Hugo's Repel skill (which you'd have to add for him) can naturally go up to anS but I don't give him this skill until chapter 3 at the earliest. He is athis best when paired with Fubar. Lulu is similar to Hugo in that his bestasset is his speed. Sgt. Joe is a serviceable healer and his melee attacks dogood damage but his speed, like all duck characters, is below average.

You can walk around and talk to all the villagers if you like. Talk to thelittle girl running around up the main street outside to get an Antitoxin. Youcan also talk to a duck clan member inside the inn to get a Medicine D. Go tothe item hut and buy another Medicine D and also an Antitoxin. To make thestory progress, go to the front of the village and talk to the man shining somearmor outside his hut. This is Jimba and he will (not) tell you the story

about the armor.

Luce and Lucia come out at this time to tell Hugo to deliver a message. Cyclethrough the dialogue options from top to bottom to get filled in on themission. When you're given the choice of whether or not to accept Lucia'srequest, you can pick the top choice if you're confident ("I'm up to it") orthe second choice ("Um...") if you want some encouragement. When Lulu says hewants to go, too, you can say that you'll look out for him or that everyonewill be fine together. After everyone's done talking, you'll receive the!Letter to Zexen. You can wander around the village some more if you like but


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you can't exit. When you're ready to make the story progress, enter the tophut on your mini-map and choose "I suppose so."

The next morning everyone will gather to give your group a proper send off.When Lucia gives Hugo a hug, you can pick the first choice ("Well then, I'moff") to properly say goodbye or pick the second choice ("I'll be fine!") toact snippy with Lucia. When you exit the village, you'll run into Jimba, whowill ask you to do a favor for him. Hugo will accept and you'll receive theitem !Pentacle. After you leave the village the world map will open up. Goback to Karaya and save at the inn or at Lucia's house. Exit Karaya again.

Here's the first lull in the game when I recommend taking some time to get somemoney. As I said before, the first chapters for each character except Chriswill be similar to this. It really pays off to take the time to do this nowrather than later but again it's up to you. Head to Plain of Amur-North. Ifyou run into some spiders and get poisoned, wait until after the battle toheal. Access Sgt. Joe's Water Rune by going into the Rune options and healwith the Kindness Drops. If you run out of that spell then use the Antitoxin.Cross the plains to get to Duck Village.

Time to play the lottery! You have an option here. I like to go to the RuneShop and remove the Sword of Cyclone Rune from Lulu and sell it at the itemshop. All the Magic Sword runes have 2 spells-the first level one addselemental damage to your attacks and the other reduces elemental damage. You

can tell what element each Magic Sword rune corresponds to by its name. TheMagic Sword runes aren't that great until later in the game when yourcharacters can deal more damage so I feel it's pretty worthless early. If you

_really_ want to hang on to it, then you can go back out to the Plains andfight until you get 1,000 potch.

Either way, when you get the money, go to the lottery board and hit X. A duckin a boat will come up. Buy 5 Sequential tickets and 5 Random tickets. Fromhere on, when I say buy tickets for the lottery, this is what I mean. You cango around the village talking to the ducks if you want but I suggest you don'tpick up anything they offer you. This is because Hugo has limited inventoryspace compared to the other main characters and he'll need it later on. If youneed to rest up to replenish spells, go to the inn and rest/save.

You need

suikoden 3.txt

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