Part 6: Waste Shaft
Update 06: Waste ShaftWelcome back. Last time Lin joined our party and we began our climb out of the waste shaft.
Music: Waste Shaft
Music: Imminent Crisis
As soon as Ryu sets foot in this room a Bind Spider drops down from the ceiling and the Danger Room music starts to play.
There are two rooms we need to clear here, with four Bind Spiders hanging from the ceiling in each of them.
Here’s a quick demonstration of the Jolt spell we picked up last update. It’s not super powerful, but it lacks the extra AP cost of placing a rune and can be spammed for quick and easy damage. Unfortunately the spellcasting animation is fairly lengthy and can get annoying, but this is a screenshot LP so you guys don’t have to worry about that.
Aside from the occasional Footloose, Bind Spiders sometimes drop Lurid Dust, another vendor trash item.
This next room has something interesting in it.
This door is marked with a padlock on the minimap.
This is a D-Ratio Door. These doors won’t open for anyone whose D-Ratio is lower than a certain amount, which in this case happens to be 1/4096. Ryu, with his abysmal D-Ratio of 1/8192, doesn’t have a prayer of opening it. So, why is it here? What’s the point of a door you can’t open?
Actually, you can open it, just not on your first playthrough. While the lore in-game states that D-Ratios are immutable and can’t be changed, certain actions taken during a playthrough can alter it for New Game+. This is separate from the whole SOL system, and only applies once the player completes the game and begins again.
I will be doing a New Game+ run, and we’ll see what’s behind this door then. For now though it’s time to move on.
Up ahead are some small trilobite-looking enemies hiding amongst the boxes.
These enemies are Baby Rustphages. They’re small and fragile and tend to come in groups of two or three.
They have an ability called Rust Armour that debuffs a character’s defence, but they aren’t too tough. Both Ryu and Lin can kill one in a single combo.
The tunnels ahead are full of Bind Spiders.
There are some Rustphages around the corner that I try to lure out with Fresh Meat, but the little buggers are too quick and I don’t have time to pull back.
They annoy me for about a minute before Lin caps both of them.
One of the crates at the end contains a Power Boost, a battle consumable that boosts a character’s attack power by 25% for the duration of the fight. Useful for boss battles.
We’ve got a fair bit of Party XP, so I decide to use some to boost Nina up to Lv. 8.
The next corridor is full of Worker Ants that run away as soon as you get near them. Ironically, they are probably the most dangerous enemies in the level given their ability to attack twice.
A box in the next room contains an unidentified shield.
The room after that also contains an unidentified item, this time a piece of armour.
Careful examination reveals that this room is actually divided in half, with skeletal undead enemies patrolling the other side. That is where we would have come out if we had the ability to go through the D-Ratio Door.
The tutorial girl is hanging out in the ladder room. She tells us how to use traps, which we already know about.
There are several Hychees in the next corridor.
There’s also a much larger genic lying in wait around the corner. This guy is a De-Volve, a lesser variant of the Cyclops we fought earlier.
I soften him up a bit with some dynamite before engaging.
De-Volves are tough customers. They hit hard and have a lot of HP. They also inexplicably carry a stuffed toy around with them.
They get really pissed if you manage to steal it from them.
So pissed that they gain vastly increased strength and the ability to attack twice per turn.
There’s not much strategy to dealing with them, just hit them hard until they fall, then grab the item they drop and move on.
The door up ahead is another D-Ratio Door, this time requiring a D-Ratio of 1/2048 to unlock.
The corridor to the right is blocked off. There’s an item box in plain sight, but getting to it requires going through another 1/2048 D-Ratio Door as seen on the minimap.
The corridor to the left is more fruitful, providing us with another unidentified piece of equipment.
Moving on we encounter what seems to be a giant Hychee chilling out in a connecting chamber.
These critters are Odd Hychees, and unlike regular Hychees they can be engaged in actual combat. They have pitiful defences and Ryu can kill them simply by chaining Slices together.
Giant Hychees drop Mega Aid Kits on death, healing items that restore 100 HP to the entire party. Killing them with fire attacks causes them to drop the even more potent Trauma Kits, but the small size of the room precluded the use of Nina’s fire rune.
Moving on leads us to another big room divided by a central fence. We won’t be setting foot on the other side for a long while, which might be a good thing considering there’s a mangled De-Volve corpse lying there.
Another ladder, another floor conquered.
The boxes in this corridor contain 120 zenny and 50 Party XP. There’s also a Hermit hiding in the garbage that likes to burst out as Ryu is running by.
Through the door we come to a crossroads. The door straight ahead is where we need to go next, but the left and right paths lead to some nice goodies.
The left hand path leads to a small room with a dead De-Volve. On closer inspection it appears to be twitching slightly…
Examining it causes a bunch of Rustphages to burst out and skitter all over the place!
Music: Imminent Crisis
It also locks the doors and turns the area into a Danger Room.
Thankfully killing the Rustphages isn’t too hard. Half of them get stuck in this dead end and turn themselves into easy targets for Nina’s Jolt spell.
The other half are more spread out, but still die quickly thanks to their poor defence.
Clearing the room grants us the Treasure Key, which is nice because the chest is just to the north.
Our reward is a skill for Lin which imbues subsequent attacks with a higher critical hit ratio. Not bad.
Through the door to the right is a small control room overlooking one of the big rooms we’ll be going into in a moment.
As far as I know there’s nothing special in here, it’s just a neat bit of scenery.
Going back to the crossroads and heading right brings us face to face with another live De-Volve.
‘There!’ isn’t too visually impressive, but it does let Lin follow up with ‘Outta My Way!’ which shunts the huge genic into the trio of fire runes Nina laid down.
Crispy.
Defeating it gives us access to a dead end containing a crate with 200 Party XP inside.
Heading north at the crossroads we enter a very large room full of junk and crawling with Worker Ants. Fighting them isn’t necessary, and they won’t attack unless the player engages them first.
If you do engage them it can be a pretty tough fight. Unless you use strategic D-Dashing to separate them you’ll be fighting three of them at once, and with their ability to attack twice per turn they’ll shred your party’s HP in seconds.
Music: Imminent Crisis
Killing all six ants will lock the doors and trigger the Danger Room music. But where are the new enemies?
The answer is back where we entered.
That’s…a big ant.
Meet the Boss Ant, an optional miniboss for this area. It’s big and imposing, but it’s trapped on the ledge and can’t reach us right now.
Your first instinct might be to initiate combat with it still stuck on the ledge. Why expose yourself to danger when you can just have Lin and Nina plink away until it’s dead?
Don't do this. Ranged fighting is exactly the kind of battle the Boss Ant excels at. First it puts your entire party to sleep…
Then it nukes them with Fireblast. It will do this over and over again until everyone is dead.
The correct way to fight the Boss Ant is to go up onto its ledge, soften it up with some explosives and engage it in close combat.
You’ll even get a message telling you that you did it right.
Turns out the Boss Ant is really weak to physical attacks. Ryu can shred him pretty effortlessly.
Even so, it’s not a good idea to underestimate it. It’s still huge, and its attacks still pack a wallop.
On death the Boss Ant drops a Lurid Stone, a piece of vendor trash worth 1,000 zenny.
Moving on we come across a room full of dormant De-Volves that awaken when you get near them. Thankfully they’re part of the scenery and won’t attack.
Heading through the central door leads us out of the waste shaft, which seems like a good place to stop. If the journey felt a bit dull, don’t worry - next update will be when things really start to heat up.
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Bonus Art: Lin and Cyclops
