Chained Echoes - End Game and NG+ Tips

End Game & NG+ To-Dos

How to access the rest of the Grotto

Go to Raminas Tower after the story events have concluded. Get back on the elevator and go down. There is a sub-area filled with new enemies and 600-level weapons and armor. When you exit you’ll be back in the Grotto. There is a unique merchant with great merchandise. To the right is Charon’s Boat. Use the coins to access the rest of the area.

Ultimate Weapons

You need to have gotten the Golden Key in the final dungeon and beaten the story boss on the bridge. The next area has a large library. On the right-hand side is a book you need to read detailing the history of the weapons. This will open a new quest you can access via the world map. Talk to the NPC and if you give him a “Rusty” weapon with a Soul of Farnese you’ll get an ultimate weapon. You have to find each of these items throughout the world. The Souls of Farnese are in bright gold chests and from NPCs.

Ultimate Armor

This is all through the “Deals” section. It requires end game drops and steals from enemies. The ultimate gear requires drops from Unique Bosses you might have to farm. There are plenty of crystals and passives that increase drop rates. Use your bestiary to see if you’ve already encountered some of the enemies.

Ultimate Sky Armor

The secret Grotto merchant sells the Golden Ticket you can use at the Hooge to buy 600-level gear. You can also buy the Soul of Dayajir and upgrade that armor by talking to a mechanic in the smelting room on the left. You can also get Balthasar by paying $50K to the thief king guy you stole from to hire Ba’Thraz at the beginning of the game. His camp is located to the south of Rockbottom. Pretty sure you need to be level 4 with your base for the quest (Two-Winged Angel) to pop up.

Elemental Tablets

Kraken.
Exit Charon’s Boat, go south, fight dimension dragon thing.
Exit Charon’s Boat, go east, drop down to sewer mini-dungeon, boss fight at the end.
Mines accessed via Rockbottom. Miner’s Key is in the Goblin Village. Buy the “human language” book, talk to goblin on the right, he dropped the key by the merchant on the left, go to Rock Bottom, use elevator, follow the path.
One of the tablets is in the dark area you drop into before getting to the sewers. Go north and fight the boss, keep going forward and you’ll end up in an oasis with the fire tablet.
The last tablet is in the flower fields by the vine blockage which has to be destroyed by an item you buy from the merchant in the goblin village.

Where to Get Tier 10 Upgrade Mats

You can buy at:

Merchant in Tormund Adventurer Guild
Ograne Grotto rat merchant (north east from raminas lower)
Desert merchant (above fire tablet).
3 merchant in Black Market (New Wynshire)
Merchant in Nhysa. from entrance go warp 1 then go to house at east.

Rainbow ore = golem knight (raminas lower), goblin knight (ograne before completing goblin quest). Ancient carcass = auto knight (raminas lower). North grotto teleport to raminas lower. Fight only spawn in entrance no 7 and 5. The other 2 spawn not worth it.

Divine wool = hana doll (south east ograne). Only 2 hana doll spawn, 1 above and 1 in center. You can skip bottom fight by using stair in middle.

Emperor hide = otter nobunaga (west beach from arkant teleport). You can and should steal this.

Bloodstone = steal only from croapier (east part of narsene sewer).

Baalrut Tunnel Map

Click to enlarge…

NG+ Crystal / Skill Set Up

These are the crystal and skill setups I’ve messed around with for NG+ to maximize damage for later in the game. Most everything is 1 shot by one or two characters until about Shambala, where you might need a full turn order. It’s really noticeable once you are in Nhysa.

Because of how hard and time consuming it is to get eight 1 slot X level gems, all the gem setups (for now) will assume the gems are two slot. More on this after.

Glenn – Used for 90% of the run until you need to do Wind Gust with Eygl
- Weapon: 1x Atk X, 1x Beast Killer X/Ether Killer X
- Armor: 1x Atk X, 1x Human Killer X/Ether Killer X
- Should have Power Swing, Cross Slash, and All Break Max. Oil Slash is optional, but useful for Vaen
Robb – Should be in the front row of the party 100% of the time except when the story has him removed.
- Weapon: 1x Atk X, 1x Beast Killer X/Ether Killer X
- Armor: 1x Atk X, 1x Human Killer X/Ether Killer X
- Should have Charge, Barrage, and Power Pierce Max. Soul Parasite is optional, but useful for Vaen
Sienna – Always in front of Victor. Used until Shambala for AOE kills, then swapping for Heroic Ode.
- Weapon: 1x Atk X, 1x Crit Up X
- Armor: 1x Atk X, 1x Crit Damage X
- Should have Kesa Giri and Yoko Giri Max. No other skills are needed. **Equip Monk Emblem for best AGI**
Ba’thraz – Once permanent in the party, stays in front row.
- Weapon: 1x Mag X, 1x Beast Killer X/Ether Killer X
- Armor: 1x Mag X, 1x Human Killer X/Ether Killer X
- Should have Draw Iron, Berserker, and Heaven of Hell Max. Light Claymore and Dark Scythe are useful AOEs for Light/Dark weakness, but not needed

For everyone else, the setups don’t matter as they aren’t really used in the game. Victor might need a MND X for healing in Vaen, but all it’ll really do is increase the ticks of healing from Healing Hymn. The only thing is having Piercing Shot on Amalia Max to make her doppelganger fight easier.

For Passive skills, the following should apply:

Glenn/Robb: Atk Up Max, Human/Beast/Ether Killer Max. For Robb, Water Attack at Max. Most anything else you can put in place of empty slots to buff stats.
Sienna: Any Agi Up, Crit Up, Crit Dmg Up, etc. Most everything else is not needed.
Ba’thraz: Mag Up, Ether killer (Summoner Emblem), Silence Resistance. Anything else is optional.

In all cases where the gems/equipment have a *** Killer spot, one should be in the Passives, the other two should be slotted gems. X level gems and Max Passives are the same % increase in damage to the respective type

On a separate note, crystals for True King difficulty is going to be very specific. As that will be a very difficult run, almost every crystal will need to be 1 slot so you can get 4 X level or higher gems per Weapon/Armor. Crystals will likely need to have elemental or status effects, as well as anything that will grant the bearer better defensive stats overall (Def Up, Mnd Up, HP Up, etc) as the mobs will do *significant* damage on True King difficulty. This will be something I curate down the road, but should be fun.