God Catching Alchemy Meister:Gameplay

Battle phase
During any one character's turn, (enemy or yours) all the hit chances, crit chances, skill proc chances are all fixed on that turn. You can check by re-loading a save and fighting the same enemy with the same a character repeatedly. Results will not differ.

- It is indeed differ if you load, fight another battle and then redo the battle that you messed up.

Leadership
Before starting a battle you can select a number of characters for immediate deployment (depending on the size of the area - maximum 9 at once) and can deploy further characters from the Base Camp and any Rally Points you control while on the map. However, with the exception of Will himself, each unit costs a certain amount of Command Points to maintain - if this number is exceeded at any point, all units will expend three times the FS per square until the number falls below the cap, which will drain each character very easily. This cap is dependent on Will's level within the Alchemy Guild, so if you find you cannot reasonably field everyone you want, you can end the current chapter to raise your Leadership cap. Your allies each have their own amount of Leadership required to deploy, dependent on their class. This number can be viewed on his or her Status screen, under Command.

Example of required CP (for default classes of characters) :

Area skills
Some characters (starting with Emelita) and enemies have area-of-effect skills which, while able to affect several enemies at once, give reduced experience gain. These are denoted by the letter M in the skill name and "範囲" characters on the skill icon in Japanese, and a symbol depending on area of effect (circle, triangle, line, or 凸 symbol) in the skill name and "Area" on the icon in English - for example, Emelita's "イオ＝ルーンＭ" / "◯ Io Rune" and Suina's 大海嘯M / "凸 Huge Tsunami". You can see the area of effect in the Information Menu, under Skill List.

To use them, select the character, click on him or her, and a menu will appear showing what area skills they have available. Once selected, you need to choose where to aim the skill. A targeting indicator will help you decide where to place the skill, showing the area of effect where the skill will land. Be warned, however, most such skills attack both allies and enemies, so aim carefully! Finally, every area skill has a cooldown period (3 to 5 turns), during which the character cannot use any area skills.

Gathering, mining, search, unlock
All units can see and claim Harvest points, but only units that have the skill Mine (発掘) can see and claim Mining points. At first only Wilfred has this skill, but other characters who join later also have the ability or can learn it from clothing. The accessory Mining Bracelet (発掘の腕輪) also grants this skill.

To detect hidden rooms, the Search skill (探索) is necessary. As before, Wil is the only one of the four leads who has it initially, but other characters can learn or have it from the beginning. The accessory Hermit's Monocle (野伏のメガネ) can grant this ability to its holder. A few hidden rooms are not available in this manner - generally, they may be sealed for a certain number of turns or require an event to take place during the battle.

To unlock chests and doors, the Lockpick skill (開錠) is necessary. Later on, you will discover doors that are locked with bronze, silver or gold keys. Recipes for those keys will be available later in the game. After you craft them, you will be able to unlock those doors with characters that have these skills. The accessory Master Key (盗賊の合鍵) grants this skill, and the consumable item Door Stone (開錠の創石) will serve in a pinch.

Wilfred comes with a special skill (Adventurer) that gives him all 3 of the above skills at the same time while taking only one skill slot. There also is the Thief skill, which grants Search and Lockpick.

Location stars
Each battle location can have from 1 to 4 extra tasks which are rewarded additionally. First task is always to conquer 100% of the territory (rewarded with money), second is to clear the stage (not available on Free maps, and rewarded with Evaluation), and third and fourth are different on every map and may involve, for example, killing all enemies, sealing all whirlpools, capturing all deployment gates, or encountering and killing a rare enemy, and give you items completing them. All those tasks are hidden at first, but you can unlock them if you finish first one (conquer 100% of the territory). One of 2.0 NG+ options reveals all extra conditions.

Weapon skill
When fighting, characters gain experience in weapon handling. Minimal mastery level is F, and initial characters start with that, while those who join later may start with higher mastery. Current value can be seen in the status screen available through Party menu. S or M mastery is required to equip some higher level weapons; other than that, it has no effect on gameplay.

In every combat encounter the character gains "weapon experience" equal to their current level (1-99). Experience gained is independent from enemy's level or number of attacks, or whether the  enemy was defeated or not. Both basic attacks, special attacks, magic, and AoE skills all grant weapon experience (although AoE only gives as much as a single encounter, regardless of number of enemies it hits); experience is not gained if the character is defending or has no weapon equipped, or if the enemy has Perfect Focus.

Required experience between levels is as follows:

E → D: 3000

D → C: 6000

C → B: 10000

B → A: 15000

A → S: 21000

S → M: 30000

Terrain types
There are several types of terrain, which have different FS cost and elemental affinity, and sometimes require certain skill to move through. Here is the complete list:

Monster level
Levels of the enemies you encounter on location maps are the average level of your 5 highest level characters that are not at work at your shop. Enemies have a minimum level of the stage level and a maximum level of the stage level+10; also, it cannot be lower than the monster's base level. Upper cap can be removed on a second and subsequent playthroughs with corresponding option on game start.

Engagements
To engage an enemy you need a ranged attack that can reach them (a diagonal square counts as 2 range) or to be able to walk unto their square (which requires sufficient move and that each square between you and the enemy is controlled by your side, denoted by being blue for Wil, colorless for monsters, and other colors for other factions). When an engagement occurs both combatants take turns hitting each other (see below). However, a ranged attack can only be retaliated to with a ranged attack, and a melee attack can only be retaliated to with a melee attack.

A melee attacker can avoid retaliation by attacking someone who has only ranged attacks. A ranged attacker can avoid retaliation by attacking from superior range, or attacking an enemy which only has a melee attack. If a combatant does not have enough SP for performing an attack (ranged or melee) then they cannot retaliate. You may optionally choose to defend, which forgoes retaliation in order to reduce the damage you take.

Number of attacks
The number of attacks each combatant performs during an engagement depends on the difference in speed between attacker and defender. General pattern is the following:

1) Attacker

2) Defender

3) Unit with higher speed (attacker if equal)

4) Unit with lower speed (defender if equal)

5) Unit with higher speed (if there is at least 3 Speed difference)

Certain skills may change this layout if they trigger: Preemptive switches attacker and defender around, Intimidate denies all opponent's attacks, and Flurry, Counterattack and Vorpal Counter add extra attacks.

As you can see, if you engage an enemy with higher speed, it gets two counterattacks after your first attack, so be careful if you fight faster enemies.

Many weapons and some skills sacrifice speed for more damage, which is useful when speed difference is high enough (since the attack rate remains unaffected); however, sometimes delivering an extra attack (or denying the enemy's extra attack) is worth sacrificing some damage.

Elements
Any attack has one of eight elements: Physical, Earth, Wind, Fire, Ice, Holy, Dark, and Omni. Generally, Fire > Wind > Earth > Ice > Fire, while Holy > Dark > Holy. Some enemies are resistant to Physical attacks (ghost types and a few Earth-based creatures), but no enemies are weak to it. Omni deals 100% damage to everything, meaning that there are no penalties but no bonuses either; as such, it does not appear in a unit's resistance list.

Hits & Damage
Every attack, be it a spell or a weapon, has a Hit value. Every creature has an Evd (evasion) value. The chance to hit with an attack equals (Attacker's Hit - Defender's Evade). If an attack is evaded, it deals no damage.

The chance to hit cannot go above 100% or below 0%. Focus, Evasive and Undress skills can modify this value; they are applied after the cap, so if you have Evasive II (+15 to Evade), you chance to be hit will never go above 85% unless the enemy has Focus. Guardian and Cover skills can trigger a guaranteed miss when they activate.

Every attack is either a weapon attack or a magic attack. Weapon attacks use Strength for damage and Constitution for defense; Magic attacks use Intelligence and Resistance respectively. The stats are further modified by items and skills (which can give both flat and percentage bonuses and penalties); defender's resistance to the attack element also matters.

Damage from a successful attack is calculated as (Dmg * elemental multiplier - Def). Minimum damage per attack is 1 HP, unless the defender absorbs the attack element (see below).

It is important to check the target's status before attacking: if it is resistant to your attack element, or has high defense from your attack type (weapon or magic), attacking it may be a waste of time. Sometimes even vulnerability to the element may be outweighed by sheer Con/Res, making the attack ineffective.

Resistance
Most characters or monsters have a set of weaknesses or strengths. Those act as a multiplier to your attack score in battle. If you use a weapon that exploits enemy weakness, attack on the screen before battle will be displayed in blue. If you use a weapon with an element that enemy is resistant to, attack is displayed in red. If enemy absorb (it heals them) this element's attacks damage is displayed in green and if enemy does not have any weakness or strength to this element, damage will be white. Damage is further decreased by enemy's defense stat. Because defense is applied after resistance, it becomes possible to kill monsters that have defense higher than character's attack by equipping right weapon to exploit enemy element weakness. Clothes or enemies can have Physical, Earth, Water, Fire, Lightning, Holy, Dark resistances/weakness. Resistance value can vary from -5 (very weak) to 6 (absorb). Some weapons have no element affinity (Physical is also an element) so they always have 100% attack against any type of armor.

Resistances can be increased by inserting some jewels into clothes of 4 main characters (each jewel increases resistance value by 1), unlocking resistance slots on some clothes (each resistance slot unlocked increases value by 1) or wearing resistance amulets. There are two types of resistance amulets - common (like 土精の首飾り - Gnome Necklace, increases value of earth resistance by 2), that you can craft after getting a recipe for them, and mutated (like 石姫の首飾り - "Stone queen necklace", increases value of earth resistance by 3), that you can get if you try to make common one, but mutation triggers.

Critical hits
Critical hit doubles the damage after defense calculations have been applied. The chance to do critical hit mostly depends on the difference in attacker's and defender's luck. Basic chance to do critical hit is the difference of those two parameters, but when the result is negative, it becomes equal to 0 instead. After basic chance is calculated bonuses from weapons or used magic skills/killing blows are added at the same moment. So if basic chance was 0, bonus from weapon was -2 and used killing blow had a bonus of +5, resulting chance will be +3. It can be seen, that even character or monster with low luck can do critical hits, if he uses a good weapon, or skill.

Combo attacks
Through certain story events, some (rather far!) enhancement slots on clothes, or just by (relative) default, characters can learn special Unison Attacks (in story events, these are paired; various solo ones exist on the enhancement grid). To use one, equip the ability on the character initiating the attack. Then, set up the second character so that they are standing within one space of where the attack will be executed (e.g. right next to each other for ranged attacks, next to the monster for melee). Then they can be used just like any other skill! Unison Attacks are generally far more powerful than the one attacker and leaves the second free for additional damage (or even another Unison with the same character); however, Unison Attacks drain the SP of both characters in the unison, so mind both totals before setting up for an attack.

XP gain
Experience is gained from both killing and just attacking enemies - obviously, the former grants more XP than the latter. Exact amount of experience from an encounter depends on the following factors: the character's current level, the monster's base level (as noted in its dictionary entry), and the monster's base Experience (as noted in the same entry).

AoE attacks give half the XP they normally would. Clothing enchanted by Demeter's Gem increases XP gain by a percentage.

Stars
Your party members and guests can be seen in the appropriate rooms in your workshop. If they have a red star star above their head then it means you can trigger an event (dialog, quest, etc) by clicking on them.

Shop
Workshop is your most valuable source of income and equipment. Before leaving on adventure it is usefull to make some items and put them on sale. To make items you need to enter the Workshop/Alchemy and choose which and how many items you need. Items that have blue sign near their name have not been produced yet. When you make first prototype, you gain 10 reputation points, each next item will give you only 1 point. To sell items you need to enter Workshop\Sales and choose which items you want to sell. Remember that you can select only as many items in one stack as your workshop capacity allows (parameter Stock in Store section of workshop). It can be increased with additional furniture. The price to sell items will be raised if you have parameter Prices in Store section of workshop more than 100%. But even if you put a lot of items on sale it does not mean that they all will be sold when you come back. To get customers and to make them buy your items you need to put some of your character to sell those items (the NPC clerk will work fine, but she isn't as efficent as most characters). His or her Service rating largely influences the selling rate. To put a character into a shop you need to enter the Party menu, select the character you wish to leave in a shop (s/he won't be able to participate in battles) and press Manage Shop under characters list. The Room's Clerk rating is the cap of how many can be clerks at one time.

The chance of a clerk successfully selling an item to any given customer is found by the following formula:

sale rate = (Service + Sales(c) / 20) * Sales(w)

Sales(c) refer to the statistic Sales of the clerk, Sales(w) is the parameter Sales in Store section of workshop.

Note that the "Sales(c) / 20" is rounded down to the nearest whole number and the final multiplication by Sales(w) is rounded down to the nearest percent. The maximum sale rate is 100% (There is no more effect if the sale rate exceeds 100%).

It bears notice that while the items for sale do not affect the sale rate, customers prefer some items over others.

The number of customers that come to your shop when you leave your workshop is equal to:

(Attract * Nclerks * Ndays) rounded down (minimum 1 if Ndays>0)

Nclerks is the number of clerks assigned to the shop, Ndays is the number of days since "Last Settlement". Each customer will randomly choose one clerk to serve him.

Upkeep
Going to a battle always cost some time - the further you need to go, the more time will be spent away from workshop. Going to any map in Mines cost 1 day, in Forest or Lake - 2 days. It will cost you 2 days to go to forest, even if you just left it and decided to enter it again. Each day you need to pay for your rank in artisan guild (5 gold for each guild rank), upkeep for your workshop (summary for all four workshop parts) and living expences (4 gold for each character). You can gain money by selling things you produced in your workshop, completing first star task on different maps (only one time reward), finishing quests (also only one time reward), winning arena battles or selling things in temple (they are sold much cheaper than in your workshop, but if you have a lot of extra reagents, that can't be sold in a shop and need urgent money, this also can be used. There are also a number of items that are meant only for selling through this method, such as bags of gold coin). You pay all fees and gain rewards for completed quests when you come back to workshop. After gathering 30 or more days away from workshop you are automatically returned to town and can't leave it until you pay your fees. Should you be unable to pay your fees, you are given a one-time funding from the Guild of 10000 Santoeril. If you are unable to pay your fees afterwards, you get an automatic Game Over. Ideally, one should keep a buffer of funds just in case things don't sell and you can't sell anything decent to Hannah.

Clothes
It is possible to upgrade clothes that main characters (Wilfred, Yuera, Emiritta, Seravaruwi) wear. Both enhancement and changing of clothes can only be done in the atelier. To do this you need to enter Workshop/Enhance. Each armor have a unique grid where you can buy squares to unlock additional properties to it. Skills are unlocked automatically when the square next to it is purchased. The price to unlock squares increases with the number of squares already unlocked, as well as how far it is to the next upgrade, so it is beneficial to unlock side paths whenever you can and travel the entire distance before moving on through the main line.

To unlock additional clothes for your characters you need to complete certain requirements. For example, second set of clothes for your female characters can be unlocked by making friends with different elemental spirits (earth spirit Aht - get her into party, level her, watch event; water spirit Suina - get her into party, level her, watch event in workshop; wood spirit Crayl - get him into party). Most of other clothes for female characters are unlocked by completing quests for additional characters. Append outfits (like Yuela's Gothic Doll) may be available immediately, but require items which may take a long while to obtain.

After unlocking any square on character's clothing you gain only one of two or three parameters that are assisted by this square. If you don't like the one, you can change it by clicking on a square, deactivating parameter you don't like and activating another one. This way it is possible to fine tune you armor exchanging defense for attack or evasion for accuracy. Some squares unlock ability to add jewel orbs to armor.

Completing the game and running a Clear Data does a few things to clothing. Any unlocked Orb square opens up two slots instead of one, and a second parameter is available to use. Completing the game a second time will open up all three parameters.

Upgrading workshop
Each of the four areas of your atelier can be upgraded, increasing their parameters. For the workshop and shop, upgrading them are requirements to rank up as an Alchemist. Pressing Remodel in the upper right of the atelier screen will switch to an upgrade area. Highlighting the area's name will show you how much Santoeril and material you need to upgrade the area to its next level, while clicking on the blue squares scattered around each area allows you to place furniture related to the area (for example, stock shelves in the shop and a hot spring in the yard).