Erik will be the first party member to join your team, and he has the potential to be one of the better ones. He can equip three different weapons; Knives, Swords and Boomerangs. Since you have other characters that use a sword, it’s probably better to leave that alone, although there are some nice options in that tree. Boomerangs are amazing in random battles, especially those with a lot of enemies, since they will hit all of them. However, boomerangs aren’t great at all against bosses, so it might be a good idea to hold off on them until later in the game. Knives are probably the best bet for starting out with Erik, since there are some great skills in there.

Spells¶

Erik doesn’t learn too many spells throughout the course of leveling up, with four of the seven spells he learns falling under the Earth trap one. These can be useful spells in tougher fights, since the damage from the trap goes off before the enemy acts, and there’s not many enemies in the game that can resist Earth damage. It’s a bit on the odd side that Erik learns Evac, since the Hero learns it sooner than he does and it doesn’t cost any MP, so it’s pretty much a wasted spell slot. Peep is not that useful either, outside of one or two instances. Cock-a-Doodle-Doo can be a nice spell for Erik, since it allows you to wake up the entire party, provided Erik doesn’t get put to sleep himself.

Knives¶

Knives are a great choice for Erik, especially in the early game. Sleeper Hit allows him to possibly put an enemy to sleep, which he can follow up with Persecutter, dealing huge damage. You can do a little better, too, with Cobra Strike and Victimiser, which is similar to the previous set, but with poison instead. In fact, the latter set will tend to be useful later, as more bosses and challenging enemies will be susceptible to poison over sleep. The Knives tree also gives Erik Dual-Wielding, meaning he can equip two of the same weapon. Of course, there’s a damage penalty for the offhand weapon, but once you have his trees expanded, you can get rid of that penalty with Dually Deadly from the Sword section. Once you expand the trees, Nastier Knives increases the chance of inflicting a status ailment with either Sleeper Hit or Cobra Strike, should you still use them at that point.

Swords¶

At the beginning of the game, Swords for Erik is going to be pretty similar to the Hero, as they share a lot of the same skills. In fact, their skills are pretty much the same and because of that, it’s not a good idea to even bother with it, since Flame Slash is the only non-situational one there. However, once you get the expanded skill tree, Erik can gain access to two skills, Fatal Slash and Dually Deadly. The former is a great skill to use against single targets, since it deals 2.5 times the damage from normal attacks. With Dually Deadly, you can negate the damage penalty on the offhand weapon when dual wielding. Considering Erik’s biggest damage will come from dual-wielding at the end of the game, then this is a necessity. Also, it should be noted that Erik gains a whopping total of +90 Attack via the passives for when he’s equipped with a sword, which is more than any other character gets for their respective weapons in the game.

Boomerangs¶

Boomerangs are a great weapon choice for random battles, since the weapon hits all enemies. However, there is damage degradation, as the weapon only does full damage on the first enemy and each subsequent one will be hit for lesser damage. So, you’re basically trading off damage for convenience of hitting multiple enemies. The biggest thing to take away from Boomerangs is that they are horrible against bosses, because of that above fact that they hit multiple enemies. There is a Metal Slime-hitting ability with boomerangs, called Metalicker, which is cheaper to get to than Metal Slash and swords. Starburst Throw isn’t bad, but it does cost a lot of MP to use and is also locked.

Should you invest in Boomerangs at the start of the game, then you will want to shoot for Power Throw. Using this ability is the same as tossing your boomerang normally, except you don’t get the damage reduction on subsequent foes after the first hit. The major investment in Boomerangs will come with the expanded skill trees, as you can get something called Double Down. You get two hits with this skill, with each one dealing almost twice the normal damage, although it does cost a decent chunk of MP to use it (Erik doesn’t have abundant MP). To make it even better, there’s a chance that Double Down will reduce the enemy’s resistance to ailments and debuffs.

Guile¶

To start off with, you should grab Half-Inch as your first skill with Erik, as it grants him the ability to steal from enemies (and also the Itemized Kill Pep Power with the Hero’s Flame Slash). While it may not be an amazing steal rate, you will be able to increase it via equipment and other skills as you progress through the game. Falcon Slash can be invaluable towards the end of the first portion of the game, especially if you pair it with a Falcon Blade, although it does require you to invest a little bit in the Swords tree. Note that the Agility +30 spot at the top of the initial tree grants a hidden +10 SP, so make sure to grab that early and reset the tree to get the points back.

The locked skill in the middle of the Guile tree is Divide and is one of Erik’s greatest skills. While it only lasts a single turn, you are effectively tripling the damage done by Erik on that turn. You can also pair it with Half-Inch to triple his stealing rate. There are many uses for Divide, so make sure you absolutely get it down the line. Once the skill trees are expanded, Erik can nab Sticky fingers to increase his steal rate by quite a bit. The last skill to be talked about is Critical Claim. While it costs an astounding 64 MP to use, it is a guaranteed critical hit, no matter what, as it cannot be blocked or evaded. This will make hunting down those pesky Metal Slime variants a lot easier.

Character Build¶

When starting out with Erik, you should probably get Half-Inch as the first skill. This not only grants you the ability to possibly steal items from enemies, but it also gives you access to the Itemized Kill Pep Power, once the Hero has learned Flame Slash. From there, you probably want to go down the Knives route with Erik. Get Sleeper Hit and Persecutter, since those are the first skills and play off of each other, then look at Cobra Strike and Victimiser. You might think Boomerangs are the better investment at the beginning of the game, but their lack of boss-fighting skills would make Erik a little lackluster in that department.

At the beginning, you might also want to head toward that Agility +30 spot for the free Skill Points, then reset and take the above advice. Unfortunately, during a stretch of the game, Erik is going to fall behind the other in terms of damage potential, but that picks up once the skill trees are fully unlocked. Dual-Wielding is probably your short-term goal in the earlier portions of the game, with Divide being the next thing you want to head towards after that. From there, once the skill trees do open, Erik can become a bit of a monster. While Critical Claim uses a lot of MP, it’s going to be a staple move in the long run.

Double Down is another great skill to have, as is Dually Deadly, especially since you will probably be dual wielding with Erik at all times. For single targets, Fatal Slash is nice and means he will be even better at fighting bosses. The damage potential for Erik goes through the roof towards the end of the game, as Dually Deadly, Divide and two powerful Boomerangs means Erik is going to make short work of normal encounters. The only problem, though, is that the necessary skills are kind of far apart, meaning you will need to concentrate on an overall package until you can start farming Seeds of Skill.