Dungeon Crawler Quest(Original Fantasy)

[mrttao]

How are potions doing in the party, it sounds like we burned through quite a lot of them already. (price of splitting up for getting more XP I guess)

We should make a note to add the XP values from divine eye for the various dungeons to our guide.

I personally would like to go for Polar sooner rather then later.

Click to shrink...

We still need to level up water to C rank before we can get polar. (polar is ice/water, right? not ice/wind?)

 

[redaeth]

polar is ice/water, right?

Click to shrink...

yes

 

[GiftofLove]

Don't the fusions have to be the same rank?

 

[Arkeus]

How are potions doing in the party, it sounds like we burned through quite a lot of them already. (price of splitting up for getting more XP I guess)

Click to shrink...

We spent 6 potions in the dungeons but got 4 in returns, and we used as many Amritas as we got iirc. So potions are still in surplus, especially as Shimah/Maya probably didn't use any.

Blizzard Sage is Ice/Wind, Polar Adept is Ice/Water.

 

[Guile]

Ashen Grotto does seem nice and easy, now that Sera has Lightning. We could also do a mission, these wandering monsters are going to see a steep rise in the importance of those I think.

I kind of want to do the Graveyard, but we should go into that fresh. Maybe tomorrow.

 

[yrsillar]

Looking at the others Dungeon lists Goblin C at 300 XP

 

[Arkeus]

Ashen Grotto does seem nice and easy, now that Sera has Lightning. We could also do a mission, these wandering monsters are going to see a steep rise in the importance of those I think.

Click to shrink...

Beside "steep danger" (and if i remember correctly people who did those were in their double-digit levels), they also necessitate us to go back to town. Pretty sure we can only accept a mission in the morning currently, and that they are 'full days" deals.

I kind of want to do the Graveyard, but we should go into that fresh. Maybe tomorrow.

Click to shrink...

Yeah, the plan is to hit the graveyard first thing tomorrow, with Al getting also a Wind Magic Skill, Sera a Earth one, Shimah equipping her Curse skill, and maybe Anshelm a Bullwark.

[Earth Elementalist] Earth magic Adept. Great at defense, decent control. 350(300)
[Bulwark] Defense, the be all and end all. None will pass. 350(300)

Click to shrink...

Looking at the others Dungeon lists Goblin C at 300 XP

Click to shrink...

We don't know for what level it is, or if it's recced for 2 or 3 people?

 

[yrsillar]

Oh, doi on me, no idea why I thought you were only asking for XP, its level eight recced party is three

 

[Goldenlima]

Water Magic and Divine eye should probably have a D rank not E.

 

[GiftofLove]

Don't the fusions have to be the same rank?

Click to shrink...

Hey

Click to shrink...

I never got an answer.

 

[yrsillar]

Ah, no as long as both are Rank C or above it works fine.

 

[GiftofLove]

Ah, no as long as both are Rank C or above it works fine.

Click to shrink...

Alright, cool!

Thanks.

 

[yrsillar]

"How 'bout Ashen Grotto?" you say after a moment, "Pretty sure the monsters there are beasts, so Maya can grab a pet, and it should drop good equipment for Sera."

"Um, you don't have to do it just for me," Sera mutters bashfully.

Maya glances at Sera with amusement and shakes her head, "I can see the value in that, I expect I'll be changing pets pretty quickly for a while though, until I get a handle on what the taming skill does as it levels up at least."

"Even the D rank is going to be pretty easy with all five of us though, especially with Shimah's talisman."

"We should unlock its C rank soon though," Shimah points out, "As Al said, it is a good source of equipment for Sera."

"Yeah, guess so, plus it is already out this way, so less chance of getting caught out at night if we run into trouble," Anshelm replies, not seeming very pleased.

"Ah speaking of, Shimah, you good on Amritas and Ethers, your SP is pretty low." You ask.

She blinks, glancing up at her own display, "I have an Ether, the boss fight was simply draining, I should be fine for one more dungeon."

"Everyone still fine on potions too, I imagine Sera and you would have had to use a few Al," Maya asks.

"Yeah, but I replaced what I used," you say dismissively.

"Um… it was the same for me, Ogre's Den seems to drop a lot of potions," Sera adds.

"Speaking of items though, Maya you want to trade for that shawl, I have a belt I can give you for it," You say hopefully.

"Mm, I think it will do you more good anyway, the charm effect hardly ever goes off," Maya sighs.

Between all of you equipment gets shuffled around a little as you set off, you get the shawl, Maya takes an Ogre's belt. Anshelm got one from his dungeon so he equips that for even more health, and Sera had one too, seems the ogre belt is a common drop. You end up giving the Bawws Hat to Shimah, since Sera has a personal skill that does the same thing.

She looks perfectly ridiculous wearing a tattered silk top hat, even the normally stoic Shimah looks vaguely embarrassed to be wearing something that silly.

The journey to Ashen Grotto passes uneventfully, it is almost worse than actually running into something, you note. You can see the tension in the set of the others shoulders as well as you can feel your own unease as time and terrain zones pass by. Still, you eventually come to the rocky hills where Ashen Grotto lies. A few last minute checks of gear, and Anshelm activates the dungeon.
The first ash choked room is just like you remember, horribly hot and uncomfortable, there are almost twice as many of the snakes this time though, they still lack SP oddly enough.

You find out why as Anshelm engages them with a challenge and misses a darting snake with his spear. His health starts ticking down without any of them even trying for a bite. You squint through the Ash at their stat panes, as you would expect the only resistance they show is 100% fire(A), what does the A mean? Well and a 50% weakness to ice.

"They've got some kind of heat aura," he grunts in annoyance as Shimah heals him up. You decide you can help that out by hitting them with a frost spray as they begin to actively snap and bite at Anshelm, it's pretty effective, two of the five you hit freeze and the rest are slowed. Sera looks to be charging one of her bolts and… yeah there's Maya nearly killing one instantly, you guess her twin knives probably ranked up.

They do some damage between their flame auras and the bites and poison landed on Anshelm, but then Sera flat out vaporizes one from full health with a lightning arrow, and you frost spray the rest that aren't slowed, they die pretty fast after that.

"Ah, I totally forgot to save one," Maya mourns, "I suppose I should just wait for one of the stronger ones, taming does cost SP"

"Yeah, you might be switching often, but it'd be kind of a waste to switch multiple times in a dungeon," you reply, "Might as well just grab one of those Uroktor things unless something stronger pops in D"

You all move onto the next one, a long, twisting cavern that winds between pools of lava, more freakin snakes, plus fire elementals, and yeah… that's a pair of Uroktors.

You grab one of them up with aqua prison before they can burrow, "Got your new pet saved, Maya," You shout over Anshelm's challenge as he goes back to being slowly burned alive, it sure is a good thing pain is dulled by the brand, you still don't begrudge Anshelm the tanking duties.

You slow the main mass of snakes while Sera picks off the fire elementals with lightning. They are super fragile as before, but they have a new trick, lobbed fireballs like Sera. You also learn the important information that Ash snakes are apparently healed by fire, you suppose that's what the (A) means.

The other enemies here have the same load out of resistances, though you guess there must be a condition on the snakes auras stopping them from healing each other, if not that could get pretty nasty. Still aside from some annoyance with the Uroktor hocking a flaming spitball at your face, the fight goes easily enough, until only the Uroktor you imprisoned is left.

Maya frowns for a moment as Anshelm pins the thing down with spear, and reaches out, clearly concentrating on activating the skill. A flash of light that leaves the afterimage of a collar in your eyes later, and the monster calms.

Maya appears to be reading a new window with some bemusement, she blinks and glances up at all of you. "Ah, it's asking if I want to name it," She says, Anshelm lets the now calm lizard thing up, and she shakes her head, "I won't bother for now, I don't see much point when I'm probably going to be getting rid of it in the next few days."

"Yeah, be pretty pointless," Anshelm glares at the lizard, which stares guilelessly back.

"I wonder if the taming skill lets pets level up later, otherwise I can't see why anyone would bother naming them." Sera wonders aloud.

"No point in worrying about it now," you reply with a shrug.

The next room, the big damaging lava chamber is just as much a pain in the rear as you remember, twice as many flame wisps and uroktors, plus a bigger fire elemental that likes slinging scorching rays that really sting… and splits into four smaller flame wisps when you do kill it.

Maya's new pet can't do too much here, it's special is kinda useless against others of its kind, but it does keep at least one other monster busy at all times, so there's that. At least Maya's dungeoneer skill seems to have kept the room damage steady, with the dungeons E rank version.

Of course, just as you are thinking it's over, drinking your Amrita…

Bonus Triggered
Crimson Wrath Arises

"Aw crap," you mutter, tensing back up just as everyone else does.

"Where is it?" Anshelm says, shield held up in readiness.

As if in answer, one of the lava pools heaves upward, molten rock splashing out in time with a bestial roar that you can feel in your bones. The thing that emerges from the lava is huge, the size of the Bull Storm Drake easily, though more narrow. It looks almost like the snakelike Uroktor's scaled way up, with a fleshy, spiked fin along its back and bony armor all over its body. It also has glowing lava caked all over its hide with no visible discomfort.

You can see it as Agnaktor, and it has about as much health and SP as the young cave kraken in the D rank, same resistances as the other stuff in here too… plus a flat 50% resistance to status effects, and its fire resistance reads as 200%(A) for some reason.

Anshelm trudges forward, yelling for its attention. It responds as quickly as one of the snakes, snapping forward with powerful jaws and knocking Anshelm back a step, even as the sheer heat of thing damages him on top of its bite. Time seems to speed back up now and you blast it with an icicle spear, darkening a patch of its armor, but definitely not slowing it. Then Maya lands a hit and the thing shrieks in pain, visible chunk of health disappearing, even as its health starts ticking down from poison. Those daggers are ridiculous.

The monster isn't done though, even as Sera blasts it with lightning it rears up and slams its snout into the ground, burrowing straight down into the rock, there's a moment of stunned surprise as it disappears, and for a moment you wonder if it ran away… then you get blasted into the air amidst a geyser of molten and not so molten rock and tearing fangs. There goes most of your health, you've never been quite so thankful for your fire resistant cloak. Shimah is healing you before you hit the ground and go rolling and lightning crackles overhead as Sera gets in some revenge.

It turns into a demented game of whack-a-mole, the boss will smash somebody seemingly at random, though mostly you and Anshelm, then snap and bite for a little while you pound on it, before burrowing again. You have a couple of close calls, mostly due to the constant ticking away of the damage room on top of the boss' damage.

You are winning though for now. It's down to a quarter health when it happens. The boss rears back instead of biting and opens its mouth, unleashing a beam of incandescent light that sweeps the entire room, hitting everyone for massive damage. Sera is only standing thanks to her fire ogre belt, you aren't much better. Shimah has to immediately use her group heal and take an Ether, everyone potions up as well, except Anshelm, whose Second Wind activated. You all attack with a vengeance after that, you can't afford to let it do that again, going by the sheer amount of damage it must ignore fire resistance.

It dies soon after, mostly due to Maya's poison finally finishing it off. You can't afford to rest in a damage room though, so Shimah tops everyone off, you take an Ether and everyone moves forward.

Of course, then you remember the next room, is snake hell. Wonderful, fleeing through a lava tube having snakes come out of everywhere is just great fun! It's draining and unpleasant, and you get bitten and poisoned way too many times, but eventually you and Shimah manage to lead everyone out.

The boss fight is much as before, endlessly spawning snakes plus the king, who is two levels higher and proportionately tougher. It also seems to have the same aura as the little snakes, except stronger… and it does heal the lesser enemies, which now include four fire elementals that do nothing but heal the boss.

So yeah, you and Sera concentrate on those at first while Maya and Anshelm poison and fight the boss, and Shimah debuffs it. It doesn't even come close to being as bad as the Agnaktor. It's a slog for sure, and Shimah and you both end up taking a couple Amritas, but eventually it drops.

Congratulations!
You have earned
116 XP
9 Job points
108 Gilder

The party has looted
2 Hi Potions
2 Ethers
2 Panacea

[Ash Snake Boots] Stylish snakeskin boots. Gives the wearer resistance to fire and poison. 140
[Pyromancers Gloves] leather gloves aglow with the power of flames, boosts the wearers fire spells and gives a small bonus to SP. 160
[Old Flame God's Vestment] A clerical vestment blessed by a forgotten deity. Grants a bonus to SP and fire resistance. 240 Cannot be equipped
[Earthblood Plate] Armor forged from an Agnaktor's scales and imbued with the heat of magma. Grants bonus health as well as having a chance to burn any who strike the wearer. 280 Cannot be equipped
[Ash fang] A curved sword made from a king serpents fang. Has a chance of both burning and poisoning enemies struck. 260 Cannot be equipped
[Fire Elementalist Job Crystal] Fire magic Adept. Good at damage over time. 300

Well, that's not bad at all for loot, your Ice Magic and Staves skill have also ranked, you can look through those with everybody else later though, since everyone else's probably ranked as well.

"Not bad loot, nothing in particular for me though," Maya grumps, though you can tell she's just playing. "I wouldn't mind having those boots though."

"Hah, nice, 's about time I got some new armor, looks pretty great too," Anshelm says cheerfully.

"It seems we will both be upgrading our wardrobe," Shimah adds, "The Vestment looks quite good."

"Um… I think the gloves would work best for me… but that doesn't leave much for Al," Sera mumbles, looking a little put out, "Ah, I suppose the job crystal would be of use after I fuse, but if you would like it, that's fine Al."

Hmm, well, what do you want?

[]Lewt
[] Evening Activities, You are probably going to get dragged along on the sleepwear shopping trip, but is there anything else you'd like to try and squeeze in?

Al Lv5
Ice Elementalist C
Health 43/62
SP 42/87

Maya Lv5
Dual Blade Hunter C
Health 56/74
Sp 12/36

Anshelm Lv5
Spear Warrior C
Health 114/182
SP 18/37

Shimah Lv5
Hexer Cleric C
Health 68/87
SP 50/100

Seraphine Lv5
Fire Elementalist C
Health 32/68
Sp 27/79
​

 

[Arkeus]

[Old Flame God's Vestment] A clerical vestment blessed by a forgotten deity. Grants a bonus to SP and fire resistance as well as resistance to fire. 240 <= a bit of redudancy here.

We should see if the fast group of lvl6 peeps would like that sword, they might have stuff in exchange. Not sure Fire Elementalist is so good for us, but it's free and it will do us more good in the graveyard than Wind... Winds goes better with our style though.

Shimah could also use it, especially if that new clerical vestment boosts fire spell, but she is going Shaman, and I am not sure having two fire slingers to cancel our freezes is good.

EDIT:
Also
--Frost Guardian: You create an animated statue of ice that guards you and attacks your foes. Lasts until destroyed. The Frost Guardian can only be healed by Ice damage. 20 SP
--Dual casting: Due to your skill with magical staves you may cast two spells simultaneously, however the difficulty of doing so doubles the SP cost of both spells

C Rank Ice and Staves!

 

[redaeth]

Lewt

[X] Al
-[X] 1 Ether, 1 Hi Potion, 1 Panacea

[X] Anshelm
-[X] 1 Hi Potion, [Earthblood Plate]

[X] Maya
-[X] 1 Panacea, [Ash Snake Boots]

[X] Sera
-[X] [Pyromancers Gloves], [Fire Elementalist Job Crystal]

[X] Shimah
-[X] 1 Ether, [Old Flame God's Vestment]

Evening

[X] Sell off your extra gear that has been piling up.
-[X] [Warg Spine], [Ogre's belt], [Barbarian Vestment], [Ash fang]
-[X] Ask if anyone needs the [Goblin Spell Pouch], otherwise sell it too.
-[X] See if anyone in the Inn would be interested in your extra gear before resigning it to the shops.

[X] Shopping trip.
-[X] Try not to stare at your friends in sleepwear. Stare anyway.

 

[yrsillar]

Aw, you act like Maya isn't going to bulldoze Al into all sorts of amusing pieces herself. Adorable.

 

[Darkened]

--Frost Guardian: You create an animated statue of ice that guards you and attacks your foes. Lasts until destroyed. The Frost Guardian can only be healed by Ice damage. 20 SP

Click to shrink...

We now get to solo stuff with our own built in tank. The fact that our ice spells will all heal it, meaning we actually WANT to get it caught in our AoE is just amazing.

... It is immune to slow/freeze, right? Right?

She looks completely amazing wearing a tattered silk top hat, even the normally stoic Shimah looks like she's positively beaming to be wearing something that epic.

Click to shrink...

Typos corrected.

[X] Al: Fire Elementalist Job Crystal, 1 Ether, 1 Hi Potion
-[X] Use the job crystal when we get back to town and put fire elementalist in our last slot.
[X] Shimah: Old Flame God's Vestment, 1 Ether
[X] Maya: Ash Snake Boots, 1 Panacea
-[X]Note that we might want to swap these to Anshelm for poison heavy dungeons.
[X] Sera: Pyromancer's Gloves
[X] Anshelm: Earthblood Plate, 1 Hi-Potion, 1 Panacea

Ash Fang is such a sexy sword, but no one can use it...

Undead are weak to fire. Two of the nearby dungeons are undead heavy, so grabbing fire isn't bad. Even if we don't level it much, with staves it'll still be useful. Shimah has too many skills to train anyway, so we can get this now, then swap to wind after Graveyard.


[X] Sell off your extra gear that has been piling up.
-[X] [Warg Spine], [Ogre's belt], [Barbarian Vestment],
-[X] Ask if anyone needs the [Goblin Spell Pouch], otherwise sell it too.

[X] Shopping Trip
-[X] If we get a few quiet moments alone with Maya, ask her thoughts on doing Lost Graveyard tomorrow. Does she want to crush it with us or would she rather avoid it?

yrsillar: Do our used, but unequiped job crystals take up item slots?I don't see the water elementalist crystal anywhere on Al's sheet.

lso our item count at 14 seems to be our total owned item count (not including the water elementalist crystal) but two of those items are stored at the inn rather than on our person.

 

[yrsillar]

Yes, its immune to slow/freeze. Job crystals don't take up slots, but yeah s'pose they should be listed on there. Looks like I got some fixing to do

 

[tenchi96]

Lewt
[X] Al
-[X] 1 Ether, 1 Hi Potion, 1 Panacea
[X] Anshelm
-[X] 1 Hi Potion, [Earthblood Plate]
[X] Maya
-[X] 1 Panacea, [Ash Snake Boots]
[X] Sera
-[X] [Pyromancers Gloves], [Fire Elementalist Job Crystal]
[X] Shimah
-[X] 1 Ether, [Old Flame God's Vestment]
Evening
[X] Sell off your extra gear that has been piling up.
-[X] [Warg Spine], [Ogre's belt], [Barbarian Vestment],
-[X] Ask if anyone needs the [Goblin Spell Pouch], otherwise sell it too.
[X] Shopping trip.
-[X] Try not to stare at your friends in sleepwear. Stare anyway.

 

[Grosstoad]

Loot:
[X] Al: 1 Ether, 1 Hi Potion, 1 Panacea

[X] Anshelm: 1 Hi Potion, [Earthblood Plate]

[X] Maya: 1 Panacea, [Ash Snake Boots]

[X] Sera: [Pyromancers Gloves], [Fire Elementalist Job Crystal]
-[X] Alice is going to use the Job Crystal to get Fire Magic though

[X] Shimah: 1 Ether, [Old Flame God's Vestment]

[X] Party: [Ash fang]


Social:
[X] That was close with Sera, give her a hug
[X] See how the new equipments look
[X] Look at that Uroktor that Maya got
-[X] If we get a few quiet moments alone with Maya, ask her thoughts on doing Lost Graveyard tomorrow. Does she want to crush it with us or would she rather avoid it?


Evening
[X] Sell off your extra gear that has been piling up
-[X] Check the Inns first for fellow Branded who are looking for extra Gears, sell at shown price
--[X] [Warg Spine], [Ogre's belt], [Barbarian Vestment]
---[X] Ask if anyone needs the [Goblin Spell Pouch], otherwise sell it too.
--[X] Sell extra items that Party has (for instance, if no-one wants to pick up Sword skill, then Ash Fang can be sold)

[X] Store Burn Salve at Inn Storage

[X] Shopping trip:
-[X] Suggest Anshelm to look at Bulwark Job Crystal.
-[X] 2 Ethers, 2 Amritas
-[X] Pick up Wind Elementalist Job Crystal if it is still available.
-[X] Try not to stare at your friends in sleepwear. Stare anyway.

 

[redaeth]

I say if we do well in the Graveyard we try a solo Goblin Grove D run. Our new tank should make it easy.

 

[redaeth]

vote change

[X] Grosstoad.

 

[Arkeus]

[X] Al: Fire Elementalist Job Crystal, 1 Ether, 1 Hi Potion
-[X] Use the job crystal when we get back to town and put fire elementalist in our last slot.
[X] Shimah: Old Flame God's Vestment, 1 Ether
[X] Maya: Ash Snake Boots, 1 Panacea
-[X]Note that we might want to swap these to Anshelm for poison heavy dungeons.
[X] Sera: Pyromancer's Gloves
[X] Anshelm: Earthblood Plate, 1 Hi-Potion, 1 Panacea


[X] Sell off your extra gear that has been piling up.
-[X] [Warg Spine], [Ogre's belt], [Barbarian Vestment],
-[X] Ask if anyone needs the [Goblin Spell Pouch], otherwise sell it too.

[X] Shopping Trip
-[X] If we get a few quiet moments alone with Maya, ask her thoughts on doing Lost Graveyard tomorrow. Does she want to crush it with us or would she rather avoid it?
-[X]Suggest that Anshelm finds something to fill up his last slot.

 

[yrsillar]

Oh Mini Tutorial needed!

So you've started collecting pets and companions!

That's great, but please keep in mind that any one party may only have three pets/companions active at one time.

 

[Darkened]

We're probably doing Graveyard tomorrow. Or at least that's what people have pushed for. The stuff there is weak to fire. It's also resistant to ice.

If there was synergy or the like, that would be one thing, but we've seen no indication of that despite a lot of obvious synergies being present (water/lightning in this run) so it's probably best to assume it's not out there.

I like wind better on the whole, but having more jobs is better in all cases, particularly as we never need to level the core job to make great use of this. We'll want it for desecrated fort as well when we get there.

We can equip wind magic after that run.

Sera is, at minimum, 100JP away from fusing a job, even if she swaps right now. We will, assuming we run Ashen again, as is fairly likely, probably get another fire elementalist crystal.

The utility we gain from being able to swap in fire elementalist and burn stuff is probably better than the utility she gains by saving 400 gilder a week from now (As our income continues to go up every day)

Having the crystal and not having it active doesn't even take up a bag slot.

 

[redaeth]

I prefer not to step on Sera's toes that way. She is our Fire Mage. Us going with Water or Wind primarily during the Graveyard run is perfectly fine with me.

 

[Arkeus]

yrsillar, if we use the crystal job now, can we give it to Sera later once she has fused hers and could she use it? pretty sure you already said yes, but checking.

 

[yrsillar]

Yep thats a valid use of the crystal. since she already has one.

 

[Xicree]

[X] Al
-[X] 1 Ether, 1 Hi Potion, 1 Panacea

[X] Anshelm
-[X] 1 Hi Potion, [Earthblood Plate]

[X] Maya
-[X] 1 Panacea, [Ash Snake Boots]

[X] Sera
-[X] [Pyromancers Gloves], [Fire Elementalist Job Crystal]

[X] Shimah
-[X] 1 Ether, [Old Flame God's Vestment]

Evening
[X] Sell off your extra gear that has been piling up.
-[X] [Warg Spine], [Ogre's belt], [Barbarian Vestment], [Ash fang]
-[X] Ask if anyone needs the [Goblin Spell Pouch], otherwise sell it too.
-[X] See if anyone in the Inn would be interested in your extra gear before resigning it to the shops. Get Maya to haggle out the any sales for loot if you can.

[X] Settle in to study the materials your mother gave you to study. Continue to room with Sera.

 

[Darkened]

We're not going to be taking Sera's fire gear or fighting her for that kind of drop, etc.

We're not going to try to run a dedicated fire build, but in entering the place known for making fire useful, why not have fire? There's no real penalty since Sera can take the crystal later anyway.

Yep thats a valid use of the crystal. since she already has one.

Click to shrink...

So, essentially, us taking the crystal now doesn't stop Sera from taking it later?

So the only thing giving Sera the crystal would do is have her use an item slot on an unused crystal (unless even unused ones don't take them) and make Al have less potential skills to equip?

Edit: Guys, give it to Shimah if you have some freakish niche protection thing.

Giving it to Sera is just a complete waste of an item on every level.

As for Sera getting niche protection, sure give her gear priority, but the way this entire setting works is that things get harder and harder relative to your level. B and A ranked dungeons, stuff we need to be able to clear to succeed, are considered stupid to enter if you haven't run the lower ranks, figured out what to use and adapted accordingly.

We will not get far if we are afraid of having overlap when that overlap is non-redundant skills that are specifically the proper skill for a dungeon.

Hell, the scariest thing about branded is that we can change specialty every day and still be a professional.

Given that we can pass Sera the crystal later, the ONLY thing not giving it to someone else does is make the party have less skills they can equip. This is straightforwardly a worse choice.