Tactics Ogre Reborn: Tips & Tricks

Here are some tips and tricks on how to play the game Tactics Ogre: Reborn.

Menus a drag?

Scroll through item/spell/skill slots when slotting things using a controller!
On PS controller, hold “square” + “L2” or “R2”
On Xbox, hold “X” + “LT” or “RT”

Hoarding is a problem? Hah!

Don’t sell your crafting texts and codices!
I believe in the PSP version, you get to keep the crafting recipes even after selling the texts. In Reborn, you do not get that luxury. For example, I sold the “On Medicine I” and lost access to those recipes. I wasn’t able to repurchase it and I wasn’t sure if it would drop elsewhere. Luckily I had an auto-save file before I sold the item.

Size doesn’t matter, but order does!

Keep an eye on the attack turn order! This is really important if you plan on setting up combos or to recruit new units! Remember, multiple actions will increase the wait time before your unit acts again, so don’t take unnecessary actions!

Put ’em to sleep!

Anyone who’s played the PSP version knows how incessant the enemy spellcasters were with status spells and disabling your units. Now the tables have turned!

Big baddie causing problems? Try putting them to sleep!
Afraid of the berserker constantly crushing your units? Paralyze or charm them!
Friendly AI units keep killing a new potential unit you’re so desperately trying to recruit? Let that AI catch some Zzz’s!

Join the dark side.

Having a hard time recruiting? Here’s a couple tips.

Disarm and unequip any guest units to reduce their chances of killing off your fresh meat.
Make sure the target has less than 25% health, the lower the better.
Make sure the recruiting unit is directly adjacent to the target.
Use the help menu to find the category of the target if you are unsure what race the target is (open up their condition page, press the help menu, and navigate over to their sprite – that’s their field image).
Be prepared to heal your new recruit once you get them! I tend to save the action of my recruiter to use a heal item on them immediately after a successful recruit.

It’s alive!

While crafting is optional, it is more than highly recommended. After a certain point in the game, crafting becomes available. Take your time with it! Certain items gain effects after being upgraded! (Boots are the real MVP!). Check out some of the upgraded weapon effects as well, as they can turn useless weapons into something deadly (looking at you, Breach).

Vive la résistance!

All armor has some innate resistance if you check their status page. Those numbers reduce overall damage. How it’s reduced, I’m not entirely sure – reduced multipliers, percentages? If you know, please share!. Regardless, upgrading armor increases those resistances which in turn can absolutely help squishy units take much less damage! For example, upgrading a basic Warrior’s or Defender’s Ring will increase resistances to blunt, slash, and pierce from 1 to 3!

Spring cleaning.

Don’t be afraid to sell extra gear if you’re low on funds. If you haven’t access to particular “extracurricular” activities for funds and treasure yet, sell any unnecessary weapons and armor.

Which way to the gun show?

Stats can make characters much more effective. If you want your healer to heal more, raise that Mind stat! Need more damage? Raise Strength or Dexterity! Stats can be raised using green cards found on the field after defeating foes, or through Charms! If you ever need help understanding what the stats do, the help menu is your buddy!

Arrows? Bah, ’tis but a scratch.

Bows have been really tuned down this time around. They are not entirely useless, however. It seems damage is based on sheer stat number, along with multipliers. Regardless, let bow users handle “soft” units, or pick off enemies with low health. To make them effective on armored units, try using their finishing skills, inflict breach status on the enemy, or inflict fear! Also, being on higher ground will increase damage output.

I’m open!

Items are great to turn the tide of battle. Make sure all your units have items equipped!

Want to make items even more effective? Some units have the ability to throw items! Experiment with this ability and toss some consumables! Bull’s eye!

Heart of the cards.

I’m personally not a huge fan of the buff card system, but use it to your advantage! Take the long way to grab those cards! It can be the difference between a downed friendly unit or an unstoppable one. On the flip side, if you don’t grab them, the enemies will!

Scout Regiment.

This is such a helpful feature! Use this to prepare your troop composition and skills. I try to keep one of every unit that is able to use certain recruit skills in case I find someone/something I want in my party!

Also, once you have access to “extracurricular” activities, you can walk into a dungeon map to scout, see what units are there, and back out if you don’t like the units you are up against. When walking into the stage again, the units will be refreshed along with the composition.

Going berserk?

Friendly berserker got your friendly units in the crossfire? Equip a one hand weapon and shield to prevent this! Attack with the shield on a single unit to save that berserk proc for the thicc unit comps.

Unagi…

Looking for some amazing sushi tanks? Beast units are fantastic tanks that can dish out incredible damage.

Personally, I recommend getting an Octopus ASAP. Their physical stats are bonkers, and they are capable of dealing insane AoE (area of effect) damage! Pair them with a beast tamer and you’ve got yourself a living sushi weapon.

OH and hear me out, beast units are fantastic archers.

You’re a wizard.

MP is the bread and butter of this game.

Units with Meditate are great in that they are able to pull off finishing moves and spells more often than not! Those without must take care using MP for times when it matters most. Nothing is worse than getting up close and personal with the boss and you’re a few points short of a finisher because you casted heal earlier!

Also, the MP Drain spell is a great way at disabling enemies from pulling off finishers on your units!

Weeb it out.

Certain classes swordmaster and ninja make beautiful assault units with versatile play styles. They are effective as melee harassers, single target multi-hit spellcasters, status effect disablers, even healers! Recruit them the chance you get!

Oooh, pretty colors!

Matching a character’s elements with elemental spells and items gives a damage boost!

Magically delicious.

Weapon skill now increases offensive spell damage! Make sure you pair a weapon skill on your spellcaster! The weapon skill will also gain experience when you cast offensive spells.

For spell accuracy, make sure your spellcaster has the passive ability that grants Spellstrike, otherwise use the item “Black Lizard Powder” for the effect.

Going once…

Need some cash? Auction off your large units (beasts, dragons, etc.). Be sure to look for new items in the shop after auction…

Pick a weapon!

All weapons are linked to a weapon skill as the skill increases in lvls so does the weapons dmg and accuracy this also works for weapons associated with spells like rods. As the skill increases the character will also learn finishing moves and the skill lvl and finishing moves gained with the weapon is transferable between classes as long as the class can wield the weapon.

Melee is stronk!

While early on dmg between ranged/melee/magic is fairly even as time goes on melee dmg will most often out dmg ranged and magic by a fair amount. Ranged dmg overall is good against weak armored enemies like casters but will overall drop sharply as the game goes on while magic will often times also drop magic users have a lot of utility in the added effects they can afflict the enemies. Overall though it’s recommended to use a mainly melee oriented team for maximum effect.

Upgrade your armguards and legguards asap!

You should as fast as possible upgrade your armguards and legguards to +1. Armguards +1 grants Jump! which lets your unit jump +1 higher which will make it much easier to climb things while legguards +1 will grant swiftfoot! which gives +1 move. There are some body armor that grants the Wade! ability which allows the unit to move a bit further through water but it’s not as important as +1 move and +1 jump when it comes to moving around the battlefield.

By geologyrox and Tobi89