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Update 11: Gathering
Well I suppose that solves our gathering problem.
You didn't think I actually wasted a Coupon, did you? Nah, I just did that to show off how they worked. You actually want to put those things in storage. Anyways, back on the 2nd floor...
Titan Arum
Level: 7
HP: 164
STR: 7
TEC: 13
VIT: 9
AGI: 6
LUC: 13
Attack Type: Slash
Exp: 189
Item Drops:
-Drop 1: Pungent Ivy - 45% Drop Rate. 1 needed for Ooyumi (Crossbow.) 3 needed for Repeater Bow (Crossbow.) 10 needed for Plague Mantle (Accessory.)
--An ambulatory flower's ivy that gives a pungent stench.
-Drop 2: N/A
-Gold: N/A
Description: A grotesque, enourmous flower. Its harmful pollen can infect anyone nearby, so take care.
Damage Resistances: Slash: 100% Strike: 100% Pierce: 100% Fire: 200% Ice: 100% Volt: 50%
Ailment Resistances: Sleep: 150% Confusion: 100% Plague: 0% Poison: 0% Blind: 0% Curse: 100% Paralysis: 100%
Bind Resistances: Head: 100% Arm: 100% Leg: 100%
Other Resistances: Death: 100% Petrification: 100% Stun: 100%
Skills:
Vine Dance: Uses the Arms. Deals 120% STR-based Slash damage to one row. Has a hit rate of 99%. Has an action speed modifier of -5.
Decay Breath: ???
Unlike the other enemies, Titan Arums are actually a threat. For one thing, they're the first random encounter that can attack multiple party members. But the main reason they're a threat is because they can team up with Deadly Durians to pull off a nasty little move. Which will be shown off later, since there are none in this encounter, and they can't summon Deadly Durians to pull that off.
But by themselves, they're not too scary. Just keep your party topped off.
Since we got a Pungent Ivy, let's give one to that guard.
You hand the item over to the guard, who eagerly snatches it away and puts it into his pack.
Thanks! That’s one less piece of junk I’ll have to find. I promised a reward, and here it is.
The guard gives you a small bottle.
Theriaca Bs dispel all types of ailments on a single ally. Handy. Though they can't deal with binds or death.
It’s not quite everything... But you’ve done more than enough! Thanks!
The guard hefts his large bag over his back and shifts his posture.
I’ll keep looking. You’re going back to investigating the forest, right? I’ll be praying for you. If you do find anything and you remember me out here... Feel free to come back again.
She seems to be searching for something... She notices your presence and rushes over.
Ummm, sorry to bother you! Could I speak with you for just a few moments?
What's wrong?
The apparent astrologer’s blonde hair sways as a torrent of words streams from her mouth.
I’m Hypatia, an astrologer with the Murotsumi guild, and I’m in some real trouble... Agata, a young ninja in the guild, got carried away and went deep into the forest all by himself!
The girl massages her temples with her slender fingertips and sighs deeply.
I can’t find him, and I’ve looked everywhere... I was hoping maybe you happened to see him... He’s an excitable little ball of energy. Have you seen any young ninja like that?
You catch yourself, knowing such a lie would shame your entire guild. You must answer the astrologer’s question truthfully!
I'm sorry to say that we haven't.
I see. Where in the world could Agata have gone...?
The girl’s brow furrows, then raises as she addresses you again, her expression bright.
Hey! If you don’t mind, um, maybe you could do me a favor? If you happen to see Agata while you’re out here, could you tell me where you saw him!?
Hypatia’s blonde hair again sways violently at the intensity of her request. You pause before answering, hesitant to add to your obligations in the Labyrinth.
If you say no:
On hearing your response, the crestfallen girl’s gaze drops to the forest floor.
Well... If you do see Agata... Maybe you could reconsider and come tell me anyway...?
The girl thanks you nonetheless before muttering in defeat that she is headed to Armoroad’s inn. You see the girl off as she leaves before resuming your explorations.
If you say yes:
Don't worry. We'll find him!
You graciously oblige the girl, who finally smiles and joyfully expresses her gratitude.
In that case, I’ll head back to Armoroad. I’ll be waiting at the inn. I’m counting on you...!
You see the girl off as she leaves before resuming your explorations.
I wonder if he has fallen prey to the vicious wildlife within this labryinth.
And why would you say something like that?
Well, he does have a point. Going off alone in a place like this would be suicide.
Pfft. We won't know unless we find him dead. We gotta think positive!
I'm with Faye! Aren't Ninjas supposed to be really fast and good at dodging? Pretty sure that's enough for him to not turn into a little blood splatter. Uh, not that we'll find one from... him. Err...
Smooth, Sidney. Real smooth.
C4 Take Point:
Small Flower: 70% Gather Rate.
Anra Fruit: 30% Gather Rate.
Hibiscus: Rare.
Common Gather Periods: 1 to 8.
Rare Gather Periods: 1 to 4.
The 2nd Take Point on this floor. Most floors have 2 of one kind of gathering point.
Hrm. Where in the world are we going to find a- huh? Is that a little girl over there?
Oh thank goodness there's someone here! Please! You have to help me!
Hey, what's wrong?
I-I-I was just gardening at my house, a-a-and I don't know how, but I ended up here! This place is scary! These huge cats and birds kept trying to eat me! It's so horrible! I just want to go home! 
Uh. Wow. I'm... really sorry to hear that. It'll be alright. Don't worry. Shoot. It's almost daytime. What are we gonna do? We can't leave her in here.
Hmm. Aha! Here! This is something called an Ariadne Thread. Just use this, and you'll be sent to a town called Armoroad. Maybe someone can help ya out there.
OH THANK YOU SO MUCH!
And Faye gets another level up. 
Line Heal now has 70% healing power. Now it's almost daytime, so I head back to town to restock. The party is actually more than capable of handling Largebills. The real reason I want to explore at night is to get the Gigapede Legs for the quest. Largebills are really common in this Stratum, Gigapedes aren't.
This give's the user's regular attacks a 6% chance to Confuse. The attack power makes it a worthy upgrade at least. The Confusion infliction is merely a bonus.
Ah, Hit forges! Those increase accuracy by 3% for each forge. Arbalists have the worst accuracy in the game, which predictably causes them to miss a ton, so this is a very nice upgrade for them.
A 10% increase in TP for Gun Buccaneers can be nice.
And a 5% increase for various classes is also nice as well. Though this particular Shield would be most fitting for a Hoplite.
Ah, here's the perfect opportunity to go over a different kind of forge. Or more specifically, some forges check to see whether they're on a weapon or a piece of armor, as they have entirely different effects depending on what they're on. When a disable forge is on a weapon, they'll give the user's regular attacks a 3% chance per forge to inflict that disable. But when they're on armor, they instead provide a 10% resistance per forge to that disable. So it's not possible to have a weapon provide disable resistance, or any pieces of armor or accessories increase the chances of landing the disable.
In this case, the Leg Guard provides a 30% resistance to Leg Binds. You can stack 3 of them on on party member to give them a 90% resistance, but only 100% resistance is considered immunity. So there's no way to give yourself complete immunity to a disable. Not yet anyways.
And that's all the equipment I got unlocked from this trip. And now I'll go ahead and show off gathering.
Now, where are we gonna find a Farmer?
Ah! Excuse me, ma'am!
Oh, you're that girl from earlier.
Yes. Um. My name is Alice. Thank you for saving me back there!
I heard that you needed someone that knows a lot about farming?
Yes, we do. We've been trying to acquire materials from the Labyrinth for a while, but finding a Farmer for hire has been tough.
Yeh wouldn't happen to know where we can find one, would you? We've been looking for days!
I... I can do better than that! I've worked as a Farmer myself back at my home! I know how to harvest plants, chop down trees, and mine rocks. You name it!
Whoa! You sure know a lot, huh? So that's how you avoided being chow time for all those monsters.
Ah, excellent timing! Especially since we have a request right now that requires such skills. We need to obtain a Small Flower for this firm.
Okay, then just take me to where you want me to start working.
For demonstration purposes, I had Alice take a little rest, and relocated all her skill points into Harvestry.
Now that we have someone who knows how to gather, the game will let us do so.
And another convenience feature that was added is that the game will let you gather consecutively. Once you run out of gathering attempts, you have to wait until midnight for them to be refreshed. There's another way to refresh gathering attempts, but I'll talk about that later.
Okay. All done. You needed this Small Flower for the firm, right?
Thank you very much Miss Alice. By the way, how did you end up in this Labyrinth?
Um, I-I don't really remember what happened. I was gardening, and then... I think I fell into this hole. Then I saw a pink light of some kind, and I think I was underwater? Um...
You're not really making much sense there. What did you mean by- actually, never mind.
If you don't remember, that's fine. Just, what are you gonna do now that you're here?
I-I'll try to find a way home. Until then, I'll try to help you all out as much as I can! ...And I think that's the last of what we can get from here.
Hee hee! Just look at this big haul! Let's sell all this off to the firm! Come on!
The stuff I unlocked from that farming trip. Life Belts boost the user's HP by 15%, so it provides a hefty amount of defense. A Hoplite may appreciate this accessory.
You also unlock Nectars, which are really important and expensi-wait, what!?
They made those a lot cheaper!? Man, Edie would probably have a heart attack if she knew she was selling those at a massive discount. Let's stock up!
And here's a not too popular change that was made. Consumables that you unlock from selling items from Take Points MUST be restocked, where being forced to restock items was limited to FOE and boss drops, and a bunch of post-game stuff. This means that you can't buy as many Nectars as you want if you didn't sell enough materials to the store, which is why they're a lot cheaper in this game. At any rate, we're done with that quest.
Hi, do you have a moment? Thanks to everybody gathering Small Flowers for me, my stock of Nectar is back up. It’s a great restorative, and it’s a must for explorers out in the forest. Oh, I’ve sent your reward to the girl at the bar. Don’t forget to get it from her. Thank you for helping me with this request. I’ll make sure to ask for you next time.
Now she has a different line of dialogue if you already sold her the Small Flower before taking the quest.
Oh, hello. Can I help you with anything? My request...? ...Oh! Oh, boo! How could I be so careless!? I already have the materials I need to make Nectar, but I didn’t cancel the request. Ugh... Well, I have to keep my word, or my store’s reputation will never survive. Go see the girl at the bar for your reward. Sorry for the trouble... Sheesh...
Ah, welcome back, adventurers! You are safe, I see? I am hearing from the girl at Napier’s Firm that you are being successful. Gathering materials like this may be making your travels easier. Be remembering that! Here is the reward! All for you! Here you go! Congratulation!
The Volt Forge is an elemental forge, so it provides an extra 10% boost to regular attack damage. However, damage that comes from forges are essentially a separate attack from the actual physical portion for the purposes of damage calculations. Meaning that if you have 2 Volt Forges on a weapon, which would make your regular attacks do 120% damage, and you attack an enemy that takes 200% damage from Volt attacks, the damage would only increase to 140%, not 240%.
Now sometimes when you're gathering consecutively, this message can pop up.
In my little info text for the gather points, I said that some items were rare. This is what I meant by that, rare items can only be received during these periods. Farmers do have a passive that lets them get rare items during common gathering periods.
Of course, there's a risk involved with this.
Sometimes you'll get into a random battle. For those of you that have played EO2, gathering ambushes are back. But, they won't always be ambushes, and sometimes you can actually get a preemptive strike. You just get into a random encounter depending on which tile you're on, and unlike in EO2, said encounters aren't selected from a sadistically designed preselected sample where you would be immedately be thrown into the meatgrinder. Also, those rare gather periods are the only times you can get into a fight. Gathering battles don't eat up a gathering attempt either, so that's very nice.
quote:
D5 Chop Point:
Supple Branch: 70% Gather Rate.
Soft Bark: 30% Gather Rate.
Palm Trunk: Rare.
Common Gather Periods: 1 to 12.
Rare Gather Periods: 1 to 5.
If you were wondering what common and rare gathering periods meant, the game selects a random number between those ranges for each gathering period. For common gathering periods, if the game selects the number 11, you have to gather consecutively 11 times before the rare gather periods kick in. Now if the game selects the number 2 for rare gather periods, you're allowed to get 2 rare items. Go over that hidden number, and you'll get into a fight. So if you're really concerned about fights, never say yes more than the minimum number of attempts allowed, and say no if you run into the maximum number of attempts.
Here's another set of items I unlocked. Elemental oils imbue your regular attacks with a certain element. Using a Blaze Oil on a sword user would turn their regular attacks into Fire + Slash attacks. However, elemental oils will completely nullify any elemental forges that are on the weapon, even if both the oil and the forges are the same damage type, so beware of that.
Success! I have severed its legs!
Be careful with those now.
There's a Greedy Lizard up here, but there's actually no way to get past it without fighting it. So let's go!
Oh, what? 
AUGH!
Okay, a minor setback. I'll just use my standard tactics of opening up with Charge Tactic and Mumyouken.
...Crap. Plan B, RUN!
How did we get blindsided when we were in front of it...?
And here's the first actual death in the LP.
We must make a hasty retreat!
So here's something very annoying. When you switch out your party members for whatever reason, any limits the switched out members had are unequipped, so you have to remember to reequip them when you switch them back in.
Round 2!
ARE YOU SERIOUS!? It only has 14 AGI, how does that happen twice in a row!?
A better question. How did that happen twice...?
Stop attacking me you stupid lizard!
Cassie! Wake up!
Ugh. Thanks. Let's be more cautious this time.
At least the party's dealing more damage than they did in the 1st fight with one of these.
It's probably not a problem! Probably...
Ugh, what a disaster. Hey, wake up!
I'm back, you subnormal halfwit!
Fortunately, there weren't too many problems after that.
Line Guard reduces physical damage by 40% if cast on the Hoplite's own row. Otherwise, it only reduces the damage by 18%.
Hello there. I am Akatsuki. Pleased to meet you.
Hello there Akatsuki, I am Akatsuki. Pleased to meet you.
Bunshin creates a complete clone of the Ninja, and the clone can do everything the original can do. Handy, and this ability is the reason why you should never use Kagerou after the 1st Stratum.
Dark Ether is almost maxed out.
The Greedy Lizard's patrol path. I was serious about having to fight it to get past it.
And this is why I wanted to fight it.
Uh, why is there a book here?
Huh, lemme see that thing.
Weird. Once I read this, I felt like I could shoot things better!
Ooh! So is that some sort of instruction booklet or something? Lemme see! I wanna see if it has like, advanced punching techniques in it or- d-did that thing just crumble into dust?
Huh. Looks like it. Must be one of those "one time only books." Sorry, Faye.
What!? How in the world does a concept like that make sense!?
This labyrinth is most certainly a mysterious place. Perhaps there are more of these mysterious books out there. I call dibs on the next one.
Wha!? Hey, no fair!
So here's a bit of an unbalanced element in EO3. There are books that can raise any stat by 1 point. Useful for giving a little boost to your party members. The unbalanced part is that you can do this as much as you want. And books are not finite, there's a way to farm for an infinite number of them. So yes, you could make it so that your party has 99 in every stat (the cap), and do something like turning a Farmer into a physical powerhouse. Predictably, this got nerfed in EO4, which placed a cap on how many books a party member is allowed to read, and made book farming a pain.
That's not saying that book farming is easy in this game. It's still very tedious and time consuming to even accomplish reaching 99 in all 5 stats for one party member, let alone 5. So when I'm talking about things statwise, book farming will not even enter the equation, because I'm going to assume that normal players don't have that kind of time to waste. Also, I will not book farm in this LP because of how tedious it is. I'll use up any I happen to get, but that's about it.
There's another Greedy Lizard down this path, but you can't get past it without fighting it. Anyways, thanks to the Greedy Lizard fight messing a lot of things up, I'm low on supplies, so I got back to turn in the report for the Gigapede quest.
Ah, hello, my adventuring friends. Alive you are, and with the Gigapede Leg, yes? Yes, this is a Gigapede Leg, and no mistake! I will see it gets to the client. Thank you! How was the Labyrinth at night? Scary, yes? Many monsters only come out once darkness falls.
I would say they're less terrifying than the birds that would be awake otherwise.
Here is the reward as I was promising. I can count on you for more requests, yes?
Wait, there was a trigger on this thing? I just kept pulling the string back.
Leveling up Bolt Mastery unlocks this skill, which I will get later, but not now. There's a different skill I want first.
The Pendant's Book gives regular attacks an 18% chance to inflict sleep. Pass.
There's another Greedy Lizard that patrols these parts.
There's a shortcut you have to duck through in order to get past it.
Theriaca As dispel all binds on one party member. Handy.
Madoras are awesome consumables. They restore 150 HP to a row. They replace the Somas that were in the first two games, which were consumables that healed the whole party.
Can't open this one for the moment.
Line Heal now has a healing power of 75%.
Here are the stairs, but I won't go down them just yet. Still a bit more to the floor.
This shortcut opens up a very quick route to the stairs.
The brown mushrooms growing near the roots on both sides of the path smell and look delicious. The sight of the mushrooms makes your mouth water... You consider picking them for later.
Ah! I believe those mushrooms may make for a nutritious snack!
Hmm, nice find. Let's check those out later.
This event is only available at night.
The thin branch cover allows you to look up and see a sky thick with stars. You are tempted to gaze at the starry heavens for a while, despite other pressing issues.
Oh, how absolutely beautiful! Let's spend some time here!
You decide to stop and enjoy the beauty of the night sky for a brief while... ...The serenity of the heavenly vista soaks into you. You find its brilliance soothing...
Yeah, let's have another break. Man, this place really is pretty. It's too bad there's so many dangerous monsters here.
And other stuff, like plants. Ugh.
That was your fault. Why would you eat a random plant growing out in the open?
It looked tasty, okay!?
Calm down, you two. Just relax and enjoy the view, okay? Ahh...
The area near the stairs is the best place to find Gigapedes.
I'm ecstatic! Ahahaha!
Unfortunately, I don't get any more of their legs.
Also, I forgot to get the mushrooms. Oh well, I'll show that off later.
The sunlight pouring in from above warms the clearing, making it a haven within the Labyrinth. In the hall’s center are the same mushrooms that were growing on the side of the path before. There is nothing barring your way from picking one of the mushrooms should you choose.
I'm hungry! Let's chow down!
Wait! Don't! Those aren't-
What had appeared to be a small mushroom is revealed as a fungus-shaped monster! Too late, you realize their form is designed to mimic mushrooms to lure explorers in... If you don’t want to become a meal for the mushroom, draw your weapons and strike it down!
...Mushrooms.
Dammit, Sidney!
Venomshroom
Level: 7
HP: 60
STR: 8
TEC: 9
VIT: 11
AGI: 10
LUC: 15
Attack Type: Strike
Exp: 182
Item Drops:
-Drop 1: Poison Hypha - 30% Drop Rate. 1 needed for Chemise (Clothes.) 3 needed for Paralysis Ankh (Accessory.) 5 needed for Small Sword (Rapier.)
--Toadstool's hypha that's dangerous to the touch.
-Drop 2: N/A
-Gold: Pseudopod - 80% Drop Rate. Kill on the 1st turn. 1 needed for Flame Lance (Gun.)
--Ferrule that feels rugged despite its appearance.
Description: A mushroom that adapted to the labyrinth. It uses the last of its strength to release poison spores.
Damage Resistances: Slash: 100% Strike: 100% Pierce: 100% Fire: 150% Ice: 100% Volt: 50%
Ailment Resistances: Sleep: 100% Confusion: 100% Plague: 100% Poison: 100% Blind: 100% Curse: 100% Paralysis: 25%
Bind Resistances: Head: 100% Arm: 100% Leg: 100%
Other Resistances: Death: 100% Petrification: 100% Stun: 100%
Skills:
Poison Spores: Passive. Activates when the user is killed with physical damage. Has a 50% chance to inflict Poison on the entire party. The Poison ticks for 30 damage.
Despite being enemies from the 3rd floor, Venomshrooms are not a threat at all. All they'll do in battle is either attack for a low amount of damage, or defend. There is one trick to them.
How cheap and dishonora- 
Some enemies have a skill that they will cast when they die. Because of this, you want to either kill the Venomshrooms last in a fight, or if there are multiple, kill them all at the same time. However, some of these skills require you to kill them with a specific damage type to trigger them. In the Venomshroom's case, elemental or Almighty damage would not have triggered their death counter, so that's another way to get around that.
At least I got their conditional drops.
And now we have a quick route to the stairs.
If you run into these combination of enemies, you'll want to be careful.
OH GOD THAT STINKS! HACK PBBBTH!
I can't tell if that's bad breath... or if someone decided to cut a big one!
Sidney, did you really have to put it like- oh god, never mind, you're completely right about that!
I am thinking that many of thousands of showers will be needed to deal with this deadly threat!
I see we're going to have to start bringing nose plugs. And skin protection. Several layers of skin protection.
Some enemies have access to their own versions of coorperative special attacks like our Limit skills! Unlike our Limit skills where anyone can pull them off as long as the required number of party members are alive, only certain combinations of enemies can pull off said special attacks. However, if you kill off one of the enemies before they can use the attack, then the attack will fail.
Decay Breath: Co-op skill. Requires 1 Titan Arum and 1 Deadly Durian. Uses the Head. Deals 70% STR-based Pierce damage to the entire party, and has a 30% chance to inflict Plague. The Plague ticks for 15 damage. Has a hit rate of 99%. Has an action speed modifier of -10.
Plague is a status effect that's exclusive to EO3. It acts like Poison in that infected party members take damage at the end of every turn, but the real nasty part is that it's contagious. At the end of every turn, any infected victims will have a 10% infliction chance (meaning that LUC and TEC affect this) of spreading the plague to their own side of the battle. Meaning that your party members (Or the enemies if one of them gets infected with Plague) have a chance of getting hit with this ailment as long as one person is infected. Cure it as fast as possible.
Those enemies are a hard lesson in that you need to beware of certain combinations of enemies as well.
The final shortcut in this place.
And here's the patrol path of the Greedy Lizard from earlier.
Hamaos restore 50 HP and 25 TP. Could be handy if you're super drained, but I never find myself using these much. I generally use a HP or a TP restore instead of an item that restores both at the same time.
I went back and sold all my items to unlock new equipment.
This applies 40% Fire damage to regular attacks.
If you're using a Chaser Buccaneer, this can be a real boon. As Chasers inherit the damage type of the user's weapon which also means it factors in the uer's forges, causing them to be a massive damage boost for those skills, even more than ATK forges.
That's all for new equipment.
Line Guard now decreases physical damage by a whopping 43% if casted on the Hoplite's own row. Otherwise, it reduces it by a measly 20%.
I opt to level up Akatsuki's class skill here. It now reduces the TP cost of all of his skills by 1.
Asteria has mastered Dark Ether, which costs 10 TP to cast. Which means...
Oh yes. These skills. These skills are fantastic and should be maxed out as soon as possible. Singularity is the very reason why you want your Zodiac to diversify elements instead of focusing on a single elemental skill. I'll go into these later. But you want to max out Singularity, then Etheric Charge.
We're done with the 2nd floor for now.
Now I go back to town immediately since I triggered new dialogue and quests. But before I do anything else, let's check on the rest of the guild members.
Royal Veil now heals 18 HP to everyone as long as her HP is topped off.
Nothing shall stand in our way as long as my very being still lives!
Leveling up Royal Veil to 5 unlocks this skill. Triumphant Cry restores 26 HP to everyone as long as Susan is alive at the end of the battle.
Forward! We must press onward!
Leveling up Triumphant Cry to 5 unlocks this skill. Monarch March is a field skill that heals the party by a certain amount every time the party takes a step. In this case, the party heals 1 HP per step. Eventually Monarch March will completely eliminate the need for out of battle healing, which saves up on a ton of resources. However, I don't advise leveling the skill past 5. Depending on what you want your Princess to do, they can be an extremely skill point hungry class, and they'll need every single skill point they can get their hands on. And healing more than 5 HP per step is pure overkill.
Unfortunately, due to the way I've skilled Susan, she's nothing but a Farmer right now. She has no skills, and the only way she can contribute to battles is by simply existing.
Victory at any cost!
I put 1 level into Berserker's Vow. What it does is sacrifice 30% of the Gladiator's current HP in order to give them a 30% boost to their physical damage output for 4 turns. No matter how much HP the Gladiator has left, the HP penalty cannot kill them. The HP penalty and the power of the buff increases as you level it up, resulting in a 90% HP loss but it increases their physical damage output by a whopping 90% at level 10. Now you might think this is a skill where you shouldn't level it up too much. If you think that, you're dead wrong. First off, the HP penalty is completely negligible if you have a Hoplite (And you should.) Secondly, this is the strongest attack buff skill in the game. For comparison, most other attack buff skills cap out at a 45% damage increase. Berserker's Vow is the only skill that goes past that.
I'll make them pay for what they did to you!
Putting a single point into Berserker's Vow unlocks this skill. This is a passive that heals the Gladiator every time an ally dies. At level 3 it restores 70 HP to the Gladiator upon an ally's death. Not really a great skill, but I level it up to 3 to unlock another skill.
This'll startle them! Heh heh heh.
Wolf Howl is an AOE debuff that increases the damage the enemies take from all damage types, including Almighty. Unfortunately, the defense debuff is miniscule unless the enemy is inflicted with a status ailment. Binds and Stuns do not count. At level 3 the enemies take an extra 11% damage from all attacks if they don't have an ailment, but they will take an extra 32% damage if they do have an ailment. I don't consider this skill great because of how weak ailments are in this game. And for the most part, you want your Gladiator to be attacking, not supporting.
SO. MUCH. POWER!
Now leveling up Avenger and Wolf Howl to 3 will unlock this skill, which you want to max out. Charge isn't a buff, but it increases the damage output of the next physical attack the Gladiator does by 220% at level 2. The charge effect will be wasted if the Gladiator's next action is something other than using a physical attack. This also works on Limits, so they're the best class to initiate physical attack Limits. All this makes it seems like there's absolutely no reason to use any other physical damage dealers, right? I mean, Arbalists can't buff themselves or charge up attacks, so why would you ever bother with them? Well don't count out the other physical damage dealers just yet, I'll say that much.
Trickster now restores Scott's TP by 3 every time he uses an attack skill.
Rapier Mastery is now level 5, which provides a 6% damage increase to his regular attacks (as long as he's using a Rapier.) Now I had Scott take a rest and got rid of Lights Out. I don't find that skill useful past the early-game.
3 points into Rapier mastery unlocked these Chaser skills. They are awful, do not take them.
I hope you didn't need that head.
Leveling up Rapier Mastery to 5 unlocks Hanging. If you're using a rapier Buccaneer, you want this skill maxed out as soon as possible. Buccaneers have very little early-game presence, and Hanging is the earliest contribution they can make. What this skill does is deal a lot of damage, and has a secondary effect in that it can bind the enemy's head. Which can be really nice if it procs against a tough enemy. At level 3, it deals 172% damage, and has a 46% chance to bind the enemy's head.
Wild Mastery is now level 7, which gives an extra 11% chance for the Wildling's animals to inflict their ailments.
Ooh! A butterfly! Let's be friends!
If you've played the first two games, you may remember a nasty early game enemy called a Venomfly, that could Poison your party and were a pain to deal with. Well guess what, now they're your allies. Venomflies will attack a single target with Slash damage in an attempt to Poison them. The infliction rate is actually the same at all levels, which is a 40% base chance. Leveling this skill up increases their damage output, their HP, and the Poison damage. At level 4, the Poison ticks for 140 damage. The Venomfly's base HP is 26, and their initial attack does 75% damage. Their AI attacks deal 65% damage.
Now Wildling's are a bit of a complicated class. See, the animals they summon are a copy of them, statwise. The stats are then multiplied by a certain amount depending on the animal that gets summoned, which is 70% in the case of the Venomfly. Beasts do not take the Wilding's equipment into account, aside from certain forges. Their attack power is their STR stat multiplied by 2 (after the stat multiplier is applied.) Beasts have no defense at all, aside from their VIT and the defense boost from Beast Soul, so they can be pretty fragile. Also, after the initial cast, beasts will operate on an AI, and their attacks will deal a different amount of damage than they did on the initial cast. The AI also differs from beast to beast, but I'll save that for the Wildling Class Showcase.
Leveling up Wild Mastery to 5 unlocks this skill. Call Owl summons a Hypnowl (An enemy from the 2nd game, which is not in this game) to put all enemies to sleep. I don't know if I'll get this skill or not.
Leveling up Wild Mastery to 7 and Call Insect to 4 unlocks Call Elephant. The Elephant inflicts confusion upon all enemies, and the initial attack is an AOE, which is the really important part in the early-game. Remember, you want an AOE skill before the end of the 1st Stratum.
Earth's Bounty now gives a 14% boost to exp.
Lullaby now has a 25% chance to put all enemies to sleep.
Leveling up Lullaby to 3 unlocks these skills. Strange Seeds inflicts random binds upon all enemies at the end of the turn. I don't consider this useful because of the random nature, and because binds are pretty weak in this game. Rotten Egg is an offensive version of Wolf Howl, in that it decreases all enemies' damage outputs of all kinds of attacks by a miniscule amount in normal conditions, but heavily decreases their attack power if they have an ailment.
You know what this does.
Watch out for that FOE!
Keen Eye shows all FOEs on the map for a certain number of steps. At level 1, it lasts for a whopping 5 steps. Whoopee. 
Also this skill is completely useless if you make good maps, and be sure to step on as many tiles as possible.
Oh, a special Ariadne Thread? Just for me? Thank you!
Putting a single point into Keen Eye unlocks this skill. To Market warps the party back to town for the cost of 13 TP. Yes, it's essentially an infinite use Ariadne Thread. You definitely want this in your farming parties, and if you're using a Farmer in your main party.
Next time: The 3rd floor.