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Newbie questions


musical74

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Sorry if these questions have been asked 7 zillion times! I found out about this wonderful game through Hanako games. I love a good deal of their games and the dev said *If you like the Cute Knight series you'll love this!!* (She was right!)

 

Anyway, is there any way at all to increase attributes like finesse and fitness, or it is *your fitness is 2, and it will never increase*? (actually, that's why I restarted one game, got tired of continually being in the infirmary!) Also, in looking at the choices for random events, the early green options seem to be *yeah, you'll be successfully, but you'll most likely lose points with someone*. Purple is *practically no chance of it working* and red is *highly unlikely it working* so more often than not, I wind up ticking people off without intending to and everyone dislikes me because I'm not skilled enough! Is there a certain set I should have to start with so I actually start off occasionally being successful in the early random encounters?

 

My character is a Hedi gal, mostly because I thought that one looked interesting. Besides competing, is there any real difference between any of the 6 houses? (I'm aware some events are house-specific) I've noticed some try *hang out with a student* on my character, some try *encourage my character* and a few try to bully me, USUALLY they are the ones that initiate it. What prompts that? Also I have seen *rumors from Academagia* all about some student, what does that mean? Is it really worth it to have a clique? And lastly, how do I INCREASE relationships with the professors? Seem to have no problem ticking them off and losing relationships but they all stay at 0 otherwise.

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There's a number of ways to increase attributes, the primary way is to finish adventures. 99/100 times, when you finish an adventure, one of your attributes will go up. Which one depends on the adventure and sometimes the final exit you choose - it's set in stone which adventure exit increases which attribute, that isn't randomly determined at some point, but different exist can increase different attributes.

 

Which skillset you ought to get early on, in terms of passing REs, is...very, very difficult to determine. Highly dependant on playstyle, PC gender, college and classes, who your friends/enemies/neither in particular are, even the presence or lack of particular skillsets can change which skillsets you need since all of those things determine which REs you can see! There's common ones, Observation is usually a good skill choice and I believe early game Running can come up once or twice, but...that's about it.

 

There's a lot to the different colleges. Most doesn't necessarily manifest in gameplay terms (especially in Y1, though that might change), but they each have their own history, specialities, and so on.

 

As for students using their various turns/actions/whatever on you, it's completely random as far as I know. Sure, some students are more inclined to, say, flirt with opposite gendered students (Cyrus...) than bully them (Joana...), and who they target is weighed (Joana, for instance, is far more likely to use Bully on someone she has a -10 relationship with than a +10 relationship), but other than that, it's essentially random. Well, Prosecution Chance is a stat that students have, basically the chance that they'll retaliate if someone does something hostile to them, but that's not something they just activate on their end.

 

Seeing a student listed in Rumors from Academagia means you're Informed of that student (like, properly informed, not just "oh yeah, I heard that guy's name once", more "Cyrus? Yeah, he's my pal" or "Joana? I have researched where her extended family lives, yes"), so your student figures out what they did during their day and to who. It's a way to keep track of your friends, enemies, and random people who you become Informed of for reasons you'll have to find an explanation for yourself.

 

Cliques are totally, 100% worth it. You can benefit from your friends' skills during adventures, you can sacrifice them during adventure (not like on an altar to Cthulhu, but that's what the game calls it...), you'll get access to their Clique ability, good stuff all around. Sure, you have to put up with them, their quirks and possibly their enemies, but...it's at least an equal trade, if you make good use of them.

 

Increasing relationships with professors is done using a variety of actions, abilities, spells, even actions taken during random events or adventures.

 

Just to clarify, this isn't a game you'll have a good grasp of the first, second or probably third time you play through it. It'll take multiple playthroughs with the forum and probably the wiki open next to you the entire time in order to learn the ins and outs quickly. If you want an example of the game in play (if admittedly with the idea that “showing off as much as possible” trumps “playing honestly”, as the author put it), I'd recommend reading this LP: Academagia

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Don't forget the power of the action "Study at the Venalicium" If you have to study, you may as well use that option instead of the bland regular study. The reason is that it gives you a bunch of free library-related skills (Research), which unlocks other libraries that can help you raise some extra skills while you're focusing on trying to raise a specific one. It's a very powerful tool.

 

 

You can also raise fitness by getting your athletics skill sufficiently high. I think it's 8 but I forget how high, you can check at the wiki http://academagia.wikia.com/wiki/Academagia_Wiki

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Yeah, to clarify adventures aren't the only means of permanently expanding attributes, it's just the go-to method because other methods are either temporary in nature or one-time only. Well, adventures are also one-time only, technically, but there's so many of them that I'm pretty sure you physically cannot run out of adventures to do. Not without some serious effort, at least.

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Thank you! Yeah, I've been playing it for a few weeks (never mind I have college stuff to deal with, this kind of college is more fun!) and still learning the ins and outs of it. Already decided that Phillip and Joana are complete jerks...

 

When I do explore or adventure it has the option of where to go (say, Dining hall) or *character's room* in addition to another spot. Is there any reason to suggest I should check out groundskeeper's area VS just stay in the room, and then check out Academagia? Also, are there certain adventures that increase attributes? I've noticed most of the early ones (Finicky plant, for example) don't increase attributes any.

 

You mentioned Study at the Venalicium, how do I go about getting that one?

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As is mentioned in the tutorial adventure, certain locations give you boosts to skills, or chance of success for certain things, or even some other miscellaneous bonus. They only last for that specific timeslot though. It's mainly so if there's tough action with a hard roll, you can get that extra little boost to get success.

 

You should have the Venalicium unlocked already. When choosing the thing you want to do in that timeslot, you need to choose "Use Ability. It'll be on that list in alphabetical order.

 

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Downloaded it, need to restart all over now...oh well, fun so I don't mind!

 

EDIT: Can you only sell certain things? I had a cloak that I got from tackling a thief and the merchant said *here you go* and some of the shops were *nope, not buying this*

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Merchants will buy anything you actually have on you off of you (meaning anything that's stuck in your wardrobe is something you can't sell). Catalogues will never buy anything from you since...well, they're catalogues. Oan's adventure will mention the details of that at some point.

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Few more questions, then I THINK I'll be OK for *newbie questions* and morph into *really should know better but don't* questions!

 

There's been a few times for random encounters where ALL the choices are purple - meaning no matter what I do, it's going to end badly. Generally these are early in the game, before I have a chance to increase skills, but YEESH! What skills are good all-around skills to have, anyway? I've also noticed that some skills are *you don't have this skill yet* but I want it, do I need to wait for a RE to learn about creativity or studying about birds if those aren't among the classes I'm studying? Some of the skills I can get through actions (the athletic fields, for example) but others seem to be *you can't learn this until you do a RE*

 

Noticed that one of the girls has a *Defame* skill, is that just for her? Be nice to slam some of the other colleges occasionally, especially when thanks to messing up, I've lost 2 merit...followed by 2 more merit...and 2 more merit lost... Also noticed that the other colleges lose merit too though - I was a bit shocked to see that Godiva had a -3 merit early on!

 

Last question is whether some of the students are worth trying to befriend (Joana I am thinking NO WAY) and if they are in a clique already, can you still befriend them and have them in your clique as well?

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For your first time through, I would recommend the investigation skills. It isn't obvious, but there are things called investigations which are certain exits that typically give you another exit or a boost to an existing one. these are typically skills like Observation or Character study most commonly, but any skill could be used for one depending on context.

 

I would recommend focusing on raising up 2-3 magic pillar skills because a lot of events/REs have at least 1 exit for them. Incantation seems to be the most common but it depends. A lot of abilities can be used to unlock skills. A forum favorite is the sphinx because it is very powerful. Try finding abilities that increase random skills as there's a good chance for an unlock that way. it may not be what you wanted but it's always nice to have. If you want something specific, it gets harder, as depending on certain skills,it can be time consuming to obtain. Still, the best place to consult for a specific skill unlock is the wiki. http://academagia.wikia.com/wiki/Academagia_Wiki

 

For Cliques, any student can be useful. In Y1 there are a lot of limits to what you can do but in future years, if you can keep her from failing I could see her easily being an enforcer for you..... If you can pull it off, and its easier to form relationships in the beginning without having to form a wedge between her and Phillipe others.

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How to properly become informed of skills is a large hurdle that you'll end up stumbling over early on, and it ends up forming a large part of the meta-game (probably a better word I could use there, but, eh...) when you actually start to learn and optimize it. Succeeding/failing certain event/adventure stages, getting certain skills to certain levels, location-specific abilities, there's lots of ways to unlock skills. The trick is to find a way that's consistent, available early and not difficult to get. For some skills, this is easy. For others...not so much.

 

All NPC students have the Defame action, it's one of many actions exclusive to NPCs, but Aveline is pretty much the only one who uses it normally. One or two other students might use it on occasion, but Aveline is the only one to do so relatively consistently.

 

If you're not in a Clique and you Befriend a student that is, you'll end up becoming a part of that student's Clique (whether s/he's the original founder or not). If you have a Clique and Befriend someone who's also in a Clique...I'm not sure, actually. Either nothing happens or the Cliques merge. Probably nothing, though.

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Hmmm, I would consider some speech skills such as Persuasion. That skill got me out of a few situations. It depends on how you make your character though, mine are all negated so I just decide to make characters that rarely use magic but understand it. For students that you should befriend, I have nothing. That is because I do not actively seek to make cliques but if you want to, I would consider befriending students that give some bonus you want. Or you can just increase the relationship value of students you like. I do that despite not gaining anything from them except perhaps an adventure or two.

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Are there advantages to having certain classes over others? Since I like Hedi I get the Glamour, rhetoric and grammar classes automatically and in current game I have enchantment, astrology, and botany for the others. Beginning to wonder if maybe I should switch out astrology/botany for something else, but I'm not sure WHAT. Would incantation be more useful than astrology, or do both have their uses? Just thinking *not sure what good astrology does*...

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We still don't know a lot about the advanced magics beyond what we see in Y1, so it's really hard to say. To top it off, Astrology is one of those black sheep magics that is more indirect than most would care for, still, from what I've read Astrology can be very powerful for manipulating events, which in turn is a great way to get what you want, (though patience is very important). By manipulating fate, one could in theory bring down whole nations like dominoes if you really wanted to. You have to look more at the abstract and realize it's limitations. Perhaps that's why the Dragons do not use it. They are obviously a very direct race.

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Academagia is always about what character you want to play and not so much what is the best. I agree with freespace that astrology is probably the most subtle way to do something but probably also need the most effort. The manipulation of fate and prediction of the future is no easy thing and also never 100% sure.

In my opinion Negation and Revision are the most flexible and useful magic we can get in year 1 but that is personal taste.

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I see Astrology as the first magic pillar I will drop studying as an omni-disciplinarian because it doesn't especially appeal to me and time limitations for learning stuff. Still, I hope to complete the Y2 Astrology material before I stop.

 

Negation is really useful for dealing with existing magic, and can be used to creatively manipulate natural forces too, so I would say it is the most important pillar to learn, but I tend to feel that Incantation is superior to Revision. That's personal taste, though.

 

And Let's not get into a discussion on how useful some illegal magics can be in some circumstances... ;)

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Beyond getting easy access to the skills and all of the (currently unknown) Y2 implications, there's also the fact that those classes might have exclusive adventures associated with them. My advice is to pick whatever classes your student would care most about, though keeping in mind that something like Botany has nothing truly exclusive associated with it (I...think, it's a bit complicated...) and can be raised to 10 easily, whereas something like History has at least one adventure truly exclusive to it (that I can recall off-hand) and can't be raised to 10 easily.

 

Of course if you must have a skill for your future career path (you know, when we get to that point come the 22nd century) you'd best take the class, but since all we have right now is Y1...

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