Monster Recruitment

The following information relates to the Monster Tamer job posting in Brecconary. Characters will need a specific item from this quest in order to recruit monsters for use as allies in battle.

Overview

Monster recruitment now has nothing to do with whether you're good or evil. You need a Control Torc. The Control Torc's power must be increased to gain stronger and stronger monsters. As a result there will be successive monster recruitment quests that must be taken to increase the power of an equipped Torc.

Monster Tamer Quests

Tamer quests will pit a solo player against a series of challenges, often with restrictions set by the Tamer. Failing to heed these restrictions may have painful consequences, but will not necessarily fail the quest outright. Each Tamer Quest will offer the same formations of monsters to all participants, regardless of class and level. During these battles, monsters will not run away -- they must be bested in combat to pass the test.

Brecconary - "The Human Torc"

• Challenge: Slime / Fangslime / Scorpion
• Restriction: Magic use strongly discouraged

• Reward: Control Torc, recruit Slime types

Brecconary - "By the Power of Tantegel"

• Challenge: Babble-4 / Boxslime-4 / Scorpion-4
• Restriction: Magic use strongly discouraged
• Reward: recruit monsters up to Scorpions

Garinham - "Pump You Up"

• Challenge: Slime-1, Slime-1, Slime-1, Druin-1 / Magidrakee-3, Skeleton-1 / Man-eater Moth-3, Healer-1
• Restriction: Strongest monster must be defeated last
• Reward: recruit monsters up to Magibabbles

Kol - "You Teach Me, and I'll Teach You"

• Challenge: Humanabat-1, Drakeema-2 (Gale) / Metal Scorpion-1, Poison Moth-2 (Antares) / Spectre-1, Poltergeist-2 (Noire) / Drakeepa-1, Drakslime-2 (Drake)
• Restriction: Must use a monster team to deal all damage. PC limited to one action per battle and cannot heal monster team between battles.
• Reward: recruit monsters up to Drakeepas

Monster Power Levels

The following Monster Tamer quests will increase the power of the Control Torc and allow the PC to recruit stronger monsters during battles. The monsters are listed in this table in alphabetical order (not by relative strength), and the strongest monster recruitable at each level is listed in bold.

Quest	New Monsters Recruitable
Brecconary "The Human Torc"	Boxslime, Drakslime, Fangslime, Ghostslime, Red Slime, Scorpslime, Slime, Snaily, Spotslime, Treeslime
Brecconary "By the Power of Tantegel"	Babble, Drakee, Ghost, Magidrakee, Scorpion
Garinham "Pump You Up"	Drakeema, Droll, Druin, Healer, Humanabat, Magibabble, Man-eater Moth, Metal Scorpion, Poison Moth, Poltergeist, Skeleton
Kol "You Teach Me, and I'll Teach You"	Drakeepa, Drollmagi, Druinlord, Goldman, Spectre, Stingwing, Vampire, Wolf, Wolflord, Wraith, Zombie

Monster Fusion

Complementing the Monster Tamer quests which power up the Control Torc, completing the Brecconary quest 'Secret Recipe' will unlock the ability for the player to perform monster fusion inside any town that has a Tamer present. Monster Fusion involves a PC offering two of their ally monsters to the Tamer, who will combine them into a single resulting monster. While the exact recipe for fusion is a mystery, the result monster will always be of higher quality than either of the two 'parent' monsters (though not necessarily more powerful or useful in battle). Fusion cannot be undone, but will allow you to transform weaker monsters into something more powerful instead of having to drop them from your roster. Each town has its own fusion quest which allows successively stronger monsters to be offered up for fusion.

Brecconary - "Secret Recipe"

• Challenge: fuse any two monsters
• Reward: allows fusion between monsters up to Scorpions

Garinham - "Bashing and Thrashing"

• Challenge: fuse a Magibble with any monster
• Reward: allows fusion between monsters up to Magibabbles

Kol - "The Power That's Inside"

• Challenge: fuse a Wolf and a Wolflord
• Reward: allows fusion between monsters up to Drakeepa

For a list of monster fusions Kyle has kept up with, please check

Kyle's Fusion notes

How to Recruit Monsters

If you have a Torc in your active inventory, the check for successful monster recruitment is run on the killing strike. The formula is weighted towards the overall stats of a PC vs. the STR of the monster. Thus, higher level PCs will have a greater chance at recruiting monsters, but stronger monsters will diminish this chance. Only kills that are a direct result of a PC's action will trigger a check; other sources of damage, such as NPCs, monster allies, poison damage, etc., will not be considered. After a battle is concluded the strongest monster that has been recruited will make themselves known to the PC in question. You can then choose to keep it or not.  A PC can recruit only one monster per battle. Human enemies (Magician and Knight family) and bosses can not be recruited, but every other monster is fair game.

Managing a Monster Team

Once a monster is recruited it can either be activated immediately or be placed in a monster inventory. The size of a monster inventory is limited to 8 monsters, including actives. Monsters can be moved from an inventory into active status in most situations, though this may involve a turn penalty to do so. You can activate monsters from inventory during battle but it takes a turn to call the monsters (similar to the 'Call Help' skill). Multiple monsters can be activated at the same time. A monster team must be declared before leaving town or setting out on a quest, and cannot be activated as part of a pre-battle command. (The one exception is immediately activating a monster that was recruited in the prior update.) If you want to summon a monster in the middle of a quest then the same rules apply as re-arranging party order. You must declare it before the end of your current battle and before you see your next opponent, or it will cost a turn.

Trading Monsters

Monsters can be traded between the inventories of two Torc-bearing PCs, but cannot be traded back. A monster is eligible to be traded away if the receiving PC is able to recruit and/or fuse the monster at his current Torc power level. A trade must involve at least one monster exchanged by each party, but do not necessarily have to be "one-for-one" exchanges.

Monster Allies In Battle

Monster allies are trained to follow the commands of their leader. A monster will have most of its ability list available for direct use in battle (zero-cost abilities are available at the GM's discretion, and will be randomly chosen by the monster otherwise). Monsters will also learn the DEFEND command. Monsters can not use a FLEE command independently, but must instead be ordered to RETREAT, at the cost of the player's turn in battle.

The number of monster allies that can be active in battle cannot exceed 4, across all PCs. Monsters must form their own group in battle; furthermore each PC's monster(s) will be placed in the same group.

In any battle where monster allies participated in combat, a flat +1 modifier to the XP/GP reward formula will be applied.

Monster Recruitment Formula

When someone deals a killing blow to a monster, a check is performed to see if they capture it.  That check is:

Let A = (STR+AGI+HPMax+MPMax) / 4.

Let B = Monster STR.

Let X = [0..31].

Let Y = [B..2B].

Let M = the lesser of A - Y or 16.

If X < M, recruitment is successful unless:

1)  A 'stronger' monster who is killed by the player later in the same battle also returns a successful recruitment check.  In that case, he will recruit the 'stronger' of the two monsters.

2)  If the monster is beyond the power of his torc to recruit.

So if the average of a players stats is greater than 16+ twice the monster STR, there is a 50% chance of recruitment on a killing blow. If the average is equal to or less than the monster STR, the monster cannot be recruited.