MIND Zero FAQs & Tips

[BooneJusticius]

As some of you have seen by now the game doesn't really give you much information regarding certain things so I thought I'd put together a topic with some information and Q&As that are asked and general tips that are discovered.

 

Edit: I've been compiling some information about the game, stats on items, drop locations, skills and effects, treasure chest locations and contents, etc. and have been putting it in a spreadsheet in Google Docs. You do not need a google account to view it, just the link - https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1tjwDrQwD4NV05TaaXmsGAWUw0zMh9E-ioK74_5WILYM/edit?usp=sharing - If the Location field is blank then I either forgot to record it, which has happened a few times, or in the case of skill cards I I upgraded a weaker card and have not actually encountered the card as a drop yet. Information is added as I encounter the equipment, skill cards and treasure chests so some items will be missing for now. Only the first location where an item is encountered as a drop is recorded.

 

General

1. You have to use the first 3 characters (Kei, Sana and Leo) in Phase 6 so it's best to use nothing but them until that point. Afterwards when the other characters rejoin you they will be boosted to the level of the MC, Kei. Thanks haveabloodmuffin.

 

 

 

Elements

General - Each character has an element to them. I won't list them all here except for a couple when doing examples unless asked but you can find out what each character's element is by pulling up their status screen and then pressing   . That will also show you how their MIND affects each particular character as well, i.e. what they increase or decrease when they're active such as ATK (Attack) or DEF (Defense) or Turn Order, etc.

 

Elements in Combat - When equipping skills on a character it's best to match the element of the character with the element of the skill and use it against the opposing element. For instance, Kei's element is Water. The first Water attack skill is called Arcane Frost. Having that skill on him instead of someone else will allow him to do the most damage with that skill that he can. For example, I just had a battle where Kei (Water) used Arcane Frost (Water) against a Lion Blaze (Fire) and it did 100 damage to the enemy. If Kei (Water) had used Arcane Landslide (Earth) against the Lion Blaze (Fire) it would have done only 50% damage, or 50 in this case.

Update - Upon further testing I found that if you equip a character with a skill of an element that does not match or oppose them, for instance Sana (Wind) with a Fire element skill and use it against a Water type enemy it'll do the same damage as if the character used a skill that matches their element, again say Sana (Wind) with a Wind skill against the same Fire enemy. This is really only useful if you have yet to find an attack skill card that corresponds with a particular character's element. Likewise, if a character uses an opposing element skill against an enemy that is weak to the element the skill is for then it'll do approximately 75% damage. For instance, Sana (Wind) uses an Earth based attach skill against a Wind enemy.

 

MIND Resistant Enemies - And on another note, the Lion Blaze is the first enemy you encounter that is actually resistant to your MIND, as indicated by the icon to the left of the enemy's name - this will be explained as part of an in game tutorial. Any attack made by your MIND against a MIND resistant enemy is reduced by approximately 50%, be it physical attack or skill attack. You can dismiss your MIND (Left shoulder button) to attack in your human form but unless your physical attack power (ATK) is significantly higher than your magical attack power (MTK) it's best to keep your MIND active and just use attack skills or just fight with MIND physical attacks if you don't want to use the TP (Technical Points) and LP (Life Points - your HP) that attack skills require to use.

 

 

 

Enhancing/Upgrading Skills

General - You can start to enhance and upgrade skills once you get to Phase 4 and gain access to the shop Moment located in Yokohama.

 

Enhancing - You can enhance some skills up to level 10 and others to level 20. I've only upgraded a few skills so far but I know that Attack and Font skills (Fonts are passive boosts) can be enhanced to level 20. The effect of enhancing a skill seems to be a gain of 1% per level boost in effectiveness, in the case of any skill that has a variable effect such as Attack skills, Healing skills, etc., or an additional 1 per level boost to effect in the case of Font skills. However, the effects of enhancing a skill will not be displayed on the skill card itself. You will see it when you use it or equip it on a character in the case of Font skills. For example, a level 1 Font of Fury Y skill card is +50 ATK which will display on the skill card and on your character's status screen. If you were to fully upgrade the Font of Fury Y skill card to level 20 you would instead have +70 ATK (+50 from the skill card itself and +20 from enhancing the card to level 20) from that skill card but only +50 would be displayed on the card itself.

 

Enhancing/Upgrading - Enhancing/upgrading your skill cards is particularly useful on Expert due to the increased difficulty of the battles. Stat gains per level are not that much so enhancing your skill cards can be a far more effective boost in combat capabilities than just grinding levels. You will eventually reach a point where a boss will wreck you unless you enhance/upgrade your skill cards. Thanks haveabloodmuffin. Though don't be afraid to enhance cards and grind levels of course.

 

 

Post Game

General - The entire post game consists of going through the Lost Labyrinth which opens in Akihabara and working your way to the final floor. The Lost Labyrinth is 50 floors. There are skill cards and equipment you will find here that can't be found anywhere else. One of the biggest differences that you'll probably notice too is that you'll actually start getting more Skill Points for upgrading skill cards than skill cards you can actually use to upgrade with. For example, I'm currently sitting at 25,785 Skill Points.

 

Leveling - You can actually get +60% experience through a combination of equipment. MPH5 accessory (complete Leo's request during Phase 3), Brahman torso armor (chest in Dream Corridor - Floor 15 - X:14 Y:7 during Phase 11) and finally, Ares's Textbook (enemy drop starting Phase 8 Fate Divergence 7th floor). Each of those grants +15% bonus experience. The important part is that Ares's Textbooks stack. That means that starting in Phase 8 you can be running around with +45% bonus experience which really helps given that starting somewhere in the 70s for level characters start needing over 1,000,000 experience per level.

 

General Strategy - I recommend working towards each character you'll be using having fully upgraded Font of Fury Y (ATK) and Font of Magic Y (MTK) as well as their level 3 single target attack skill (the ones with ++++ damage) as well as their respective Greater Boost skill cards. For the accessories I will be equipping Styx Droplets (found as drops from enemies starting with Abyss Closes 1st floor during Phase 10. You can just use physical attacks if you want but in my experience right now it's not uncommon for battles to take close to 10 turns fighting that way. Currently I'm using Kei (93), Sana (88) and Kotone (90).

 

Post Game Combat

Equipment - Use pretty much whatever you want though for the accessory for each character I use Styx Droplets which regenerate LP. They regenerate about 300 LP per turn. You can start finding them as drops from enemies in Abyss Closes 1st floor during Phase 10.

 

0-1 MIND Resistant Enemies - My strategy with the above characters is to have each use their attack skill in turn 1 as that will take care of 2-3 enemies depending on if any guarded. In turn 2 I put the MINDs away and Charge for a turn or two. (Charging restores 2 TP per turn. Charging also increases your defense. Leo and Lina are the only ones without a Defense Down effect on their MIND so every character will be pretty resilient while Charging). Then in turn 4 I attack the remaining 1-2 enemies with physical attacks. By doing this combat has yet to last past 5 turns and I'm on floor 19 of the Lost Labyrinth.

 

2+ MIND Resistant Enemies - Now, if there are 2 or more MIND resistant enemies, and since they're always Fire based, I'll have Kei use his skill attack on one of them and the other 2 characters use their skill attacks on the regular enemies if there are any. If all enemies are MIND resistant then I'll just have the other 2 characters attack the same one as Kei which so far kills any MIND resistant enemy in 1 turn. (Kei in my game has Greater Boost Water and Font of Fury Y maxed and Neptune's Wrath at level 11.) I'll do that for 2 turns or until there is only 1 MIND resistant enemy left, whichever comes first. Next, if there are 2+ MIND resistant enemies left I'll put the MINDs away and just use physical attacks until the battle is over. If there is only 1 MIND resistant enemy left then I'll put the MINDs away, Charge for a turn and then do physical attacks until the battle is over. Attacking without your MIND actually regenerates 3 TP per turn. 

 

 

If anyone has any other tips or questions they want to ask feel free to post it here and I'm sure someone will be able to assist.

 

Updated with the information from haveabloodmuffin as well as some element effects I tested.

Edited September 13, 2014 by BooneJusticius

[aquartertothree]

Don't have much to add but I really want to stress how important upgrading/enhancing skill cards is, especially on Expert. You can grind away all you want with levels but there will probably be a point/certain boss that will absolutely wreck you unless you start to upgrade.

 

Also if at all possible don't use any of the party members that are added after the original three until after Phase 6. They will scale to the level of the main character.

[purgta]

Is it better to upgrade passive skill cards or Attack/Support skill cards first? I am currently stuck on the Phase 4 Boss and engraved spears are kind of rare at the moment.

[BooneJusticius]

Don't have much to add but I really want to stress how important upgrading/enhancing skill cards is, especially on Expert. You can grind away all you want with levels but there will probably be a point/certain boss that will absolutely wreck you unless you start to upgrade.

 

Also if at all possible don't use any of the party members that are added after the original three until after Phase 6. They will scale to the level of the main character.

 

Thanks, I forgot to put that in about the original 3. I'll add something about that and about enhancing the cards. You can only hold 256 of them anyways so a person might as well enhance.

 

 

Is it better to upgrade passive skill cards or Attack/Support skill cards first? I am currently stuck on the Phase 4 Boss and engraved spears are kind of rare at the moment.

 

When you get access to Moment you'll only have enough of the various Engraved Sphere cards to fully upgrade 1 skill. I've only made it to phase 4 (I restarted to record equipment and skill card drop locations as well as chest locations and contents) but from what I've read you won't really start having Engraved Sphere cards drop until Phase 7 or so. At some point in Phase 3 I found a Font of Magic card so I fully upgraded that. I gave it to Sana along with an Anemoi's Whisper (Wind ATK +10%) and in Phase 4 at level 25 on Expert she was doing about 700 damage to opposing element enemies which kills them in 1 use.

[BooneJusticius]

I decided to level all secondary characters to 55 to see how they all compare so I can decide who I actually want in my party. I took screenshots of their status screens without any equipment or passive skills equipped that'd affect any of their stats.

 

Kei is not included as to me he is the main character and not someone I plan on removing from my party, even though you can switch him out too if you want to. He also requires less experience than the others per level and there's the trophy about getting him to level 99 so leaving him in your party all the time will get him to 99 in the least amount of time possible. Characters that do not participate in combat do gain experience still but it is drastically reduced to approximately 30% of what the characters who participate in battle receive.

 

Keep in mind when looking at these stats that they will be affected by whatever additional effects their MINDS have when active. For instance, Leo already has the highest attack of 212 at level 55 but his MIND's effect is also Attack up so his attack will be even higher. On the other end of the spectrum you have Lina, 141 ATK at level 55 and her MIND's effect is Attack down.

 

Sana - Wind

 

Leo - Earth

 

Yoichi - Wind

 

Kotone - Fire

 

Lina - Water & Wind

Edited September 8, 2014 by BooneJusticius