Sharom Border

Size: 2x2 (Small) Overall Terrain: Coastal Region 24 Hour Speed: Normal Stage Music: Thunder Overall Difficulty: 2 Stage Boss: Usar

City & Roshian Temple Information Cities (6) Hidden Cities (2) Roshian Temples (2) Buried Treasure (1) Svastpol Ellery RT #1: E of Abdella; 1) Island S of Ellery Rebel Base On the NE most island along the road     Jindark Fallsala RT #2 (H): Island in the     Boss Castle At the end of the road NE corner of the map     Abdella along the W edge of the       SW of Svastpol map       Valikesh         Slightly SE of Jindark         Valna (Shop)         Slightly NW of Svastpol

Stage Shop Wares

Valna “CURE” (Cure Potion) 400 Goth “HEAL” (Cure Stone) 700 Goth “BELL” (Dinner Bell) 2,000 Goth “REVIVE” (Ethereal Flute) 2,000 Goth “SUMMONS” (Mass Summons) 3,000 Goth

Now we’re cookin’! While you have a unit stationed at the town of Valna, if you select the “Edit” command on this unit, you will see that there is a “Buy Item” option available to you. This allows the unit to buy any of the items listed above, and the goods get added to your main item inventory list. Simple enough, eh? Just don’t go overboard with buying items right now, because you don’t have nearly enough Goth yet to throw it around willy-nilly.

Neutral Encounters

LV: 3 Golem LV: 1 Dragon LV: 3 Hawk Man Forest Mountains near Svastpol Ocean nearby Abdella

The Dragon is a big help to get this early in the game.  The Hawk Man is also an awesome edition, as he will give the unit he’s a part of Low Sky to boot!  Definitely take the time to find these two. Golems blow, so don’t bother with them!

Enemy Units

Different Types of Units: 7 Total Enemy Unit Deployed: 10 Enemy Level Threshold: 3 - 4 Unit# 2-1

Seeing as this is the first stage, none of the units are too difficult.  The computer has really stupid formations, like Amazon in the Rront Row, and other no-no’s like that which make them all the easier to beat.  So make him pay for it! Almost all of these units will travel along the main road to try and take your main base, except for the High Sky units.  They will shortcut over the water for a more direct approach.  There are only two units that you should really be careful of; Unit# 2-3 & Unit# 2-4.  Watch out for these!

Beat The Stage!

Prologue:  Usar is the puppet ruler of this region. He’s bought into the Empire, and now you have to take him out!  Usar and Lans have some history and know each other, so allow him the opportunity to ‘catch up’ with an old friend...

Deployment Time!
Now that the enemy faction will actually send out units at you, and you have more than just one unit to deploy, it’s time to consider where you send them. Almost all of the enemy units will come at you along the main road, but there will be a flying and water unit that will come from the top, with designs on your main base! Just be ready for them.

Step 1:  Most of the action will take place along the the main road, which goes right to the boss castle of Jindark.  However, you should only need about 6 or 7 total units to beat this stage; not the total nine that you can deploy. You may want to have the unit that Warren in it sit this stage out. Why? Well, for him to reach the ultimate goal of Lich, he must become a Mage first.  Which means that you need some semblance of Charisma & Alignment.  So, if his level gets too high, he will lose both of these stats in a hurry as he kills things, making the promotion to Mage impossible. All of your units are probably about the same, you don’t have to worry about unit assignments at this point.

Step 2:  Have most of your units go down the main road, liberating towns as you go. The only units that you should not send down this road are your flying units, any water units that you have, and your Opinion Leader’s unit with a Gryphon in it.  The flying unit should liberate the hidden Roshian Temple and the hidden town of Ellery, and find the buried treasure that is on the island.  This unit can also fight any guys that wander up towards Ellery as well.

You should have a unit quickly snag the shop town of Valna.  From here, as long as you have a unit stationed on this town, you can buy items! You may want to pick up some healing items, but your Goth reserves are probably very low after just deploying many units, so take it easy this time around.

You need to leave your Opinion Leader in the background and not have him fight, however.  Let him/her run around behind all of the action and pick up things your front line fighting units have missed.  This is what you should do with him most stages anyway. The reason why he should not really participate in these beginning few stages is because in order for your Opinion Leader to get really high Charisma & Alignment is to not even have him fight until about the fifth stage or so.  This way, you don’t have to stress over what characters he kills, because they will all garner some type of incriment in Charisma &/or Alignment.  Besides, using Tarot Cards to kill enemy characters gives him/her experience anyway, so it’s not like his/her level will be stuck at 1 until you do choose to fight.

M.O.B.Q. Tip!

The one thing that you might want to do with your bored Opinion Leader is to search out for the neutral encounters on this stage.  Both the Dragon and the Hawk Man will be extremely useful! Have your Opinion Leader unit patrol around the mountains near the rebel base Svastpol, and there is a Level 1 Dragon that should show himself soon enough. The Hawk Man is somewhere in the deep water area above the town Abdella.  These two neutral encounters are not always in the exact same spot, but close enough to these spots I’ve described.  You could also have him/her run around and find buried treasure to help make your young army more formidable.

Step 3:  Make sure that you liberate the hidden Roshian Temple to the north. Once you do, you will receive the “HEROSTAR” (Star of Heroes) from the monk. You don’t need to have any special requirements to get this item, so don’t worry. Show up, and it’s yours! This item is necessary for the getting several special characters and items later on; among other things. Do not ever sell this item!

By this point, you menagerie of units along the main road should be at the Roshian Temple along the road or past it. Once you're this far, you don't need to be guarding any towns behind the front really. Leapfrog onto the Roshian Temple, and move the rest of the units on up.  You also probably have eliminated the northern threats as well, so bring those units that are up there west to the boss castle of Jindark.

Step 4:  Send a token unit that does not have Lans in it down to liberate the hidden town of Fallsala.  There is an item here to pick up after you beat the stage. Have Lans’s unit liberate Valikesh, ready for the impending attack.  At this point, all of the enemy units should be gone, or severely weakened otherwise. For some fun back story, have a unit led by Lans face off against the boss Usar.  It’s not really necessary for the best ending, but you’d be a meanie not to!  They trade insults, and then they will

Fight It Out!!

Boss Time!

Usar Wild Man HP 120 LV 5 STR 76 CHA 57 AGI 72 ALI 43 INT 57 LUK 59 LV: 4 Wizard     LV: 5 Wild Man LV: 4 Wizard       2 Direct & 4 Targeted

This fight is a bit tougher than most you’ve come across up to this point. Unlike Warren on the previous stage, this boss actually has some hired hands to help.  Also, for any battle in which you do not defeat Usar, you automatically lose; if even you do manage to defeat both of his Back Row Wizards and inflict more total damage! And, if any of his retinue die off, they instantly get replaced with a fresh ones! So, as with all of the boss battles from here on out, concentrate all of your attacks on the boss. Lucky for you, Usar is in the Front Row, middle slot.  All of your Front Row character have no choice but to smack him! The Wizards he has are weak Hit Point wise, but will probably try and concentrate their fire on one character of yours, so be ready for that.  You will probably defeat Usar before it is a concern, though.  Overall, not a very tough boss fight, especially if you slip in a Tarot Card or two!  Try not to have the killing blow be from a Tarot Card however, or else the experience will go to your Opinion Leader instead.  Getting in this habit will make your Opinion Leader’s levels way higher than you would like, giving you very little leeway when he/she does have to fight.  It will be better suited on a normal character or Lans.

Available Items

Excluding the shop, here are the other items that you can find on this stage.  One of them is really important! Don’t forget to find it while you are on the stage! 

SNES Name: HEROSTAR Selling Price: 5 Goth PSX / Full Name: Star of Heroes Buying Price: - - Description: “Emblem of a hero. Only the chosen one can obtain.”

SNES Name: NUGGET Selling Price: 40,000 Goth PSX / Full Name: Gnomish Nugget Buying Price: - - Description: “A lump of gold that contains the spirit of the earth.”

SNES Name: UNDEAD Selling Price: 15,000 Goth PSX / Full Name: Undead Ring Buying Price: - - Effect: Promotes a Sorcerer to a Lich! Promotes a Tiamat to a Zombie Dragon! Description: “Ring of the undead. Use it on a Sorcerer and...”

Aftermath

There are some things that you can do here, but you will have to come back after doing several stages that are much farther down the road to get the best of them. And your journey has just begun...

1) Visit the town of Fallsala.  This was a hidden town off the west edge of the map.  The people will give you their town treasure, the “NUGGET” (Gnomish Nugget).  This is your first “sell for Goth” item.  Throughout the game, you will come across several items that serve no functional purpose other than to sell them from your item menu for a great amount of Goth. Just like this one!  So, sell this one to give your war chest a much needed boost at this early point in the game.

1) This is the good item. Upon revisiting the town of Valna, the shop town, you will be greeted by a mage named Badista.  He is looking for a specific book, and will reward you handily should you find it and bring it to him.  The book goes by many names, but you will come to know it as the “LEXICON” (Book of the Dead).  You won’t find one of these for a while, either.  Your first one will appear on Muspelm, and the second can be found on City of Malano.  When you manage to find one and bring it here, Badista will trade you an “UNDEAD” (Undead Ring) for it! You can use these to promote your Sorcerers into super charged Liches, or a Tiamat into a Zombie Dragon!  Just smile and nod for now, because you are nowhere close to getting these classes!  This best part is that he will do this every time you bring him a “LEXICON” (Book of the Dead), so this is a great source for “UNDEADS” (Undead Rings)!