| Common Artifact | HP | ARM | CAP | STR | MAG | SKL | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Steel Arming Sword | 1 | 1 | 1 | ||||
| Elegant Blade | -2 | -1 | 1 | ||||
| Steel Great Sword | 2 | 3 | |||||
| Sayunarii War Pike | 4 | 1 | 1 | +15% Damage to cavalry | |||
| Acolyte’s Mace | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | |||
| Crusader’s Mace | 2 | 4 | -5 | ||||
| Guerilla Bow | 1 | 1 | +15% Hit rate | ||||
| Donari Staff | 1 | 2 | +10% Out of combat healing | ||||
| Apprentice Spellbook | -2 | 1 | -2 | 2 | 2 | ||
| Sergeant’s Uniform | 3 | ||||||
| Scout’s Gear | 1 | 2 | |||||
| Guerilla Armor | 2 | No movement penalty in woods | |||||
| Steel Plate Armor | 10 | 4 | 2 | -3 | |||
| Donari Armor | 15 | 4 | 2 | 4 | |||
| Ruby Ring | 1 | 3 | |||||
| Emerald Ring | 1 | 3 | |||||
| Sapphire Ring | 1 | 3 |
| Uncommon Artifact | HP | ARM | CAP | STR | MAG | SKL | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Flame Saber | 2 | 7 | |||||
| Steelshatter | 2 | 2 | 1 | Ignore 20% of armor | |||
| Giant’s Thresher | 2 | 3 | +25% Damage against larger squads -25% Damage against smaller squads | ||||
| Kesh’s Daikatana | -6 | 1 | 3 | +5% Evasion | |||
| Crystal Lance | 3 | 1 | -2 | 3 | +10% Dark resist | ||
| Obsidian Edge | -20 | 2 | 6 | +25% Damage to boss squads (humans only) | |||
| Zero Point Blade | 30 | 8 | 2 | -2 | |||
| Trueshot Bow | 2 | 15 | |||||
| Auraweave Cloak | 2 | 6 | |||||
| Officer’s Regalia | 2 | -15% Damage taken on defense | |||||
| Shinobi Gi | 2 | 12 | +3% Evasion | ||||
| Guerilla Armor | 2 | No movement penalty in woods | |||||
| Blademaster’s Armor | 18 | 4 | 3 | -25% Damage from swords | |||
| Dragonscale Armor | -20 | 5 | 2 | 4 | -10% Damage from dragons | ||
| Hulking Pavise | 8 | 4 | 2 | -2 | -15% Damage from firearms | ||
| Aldor’s Tower Shield | 10 | 2 | -5 | -15% Damage from archery | |||
| Puffin Feather Amulet | -4 | 1 | 8 | +7% Evasion | |||
| Ribbon | 2 | Immune to magical stun | |||||
| Noisy Cricket | 1 | Squad more likely to be attacked | |||||
| Firewalker Boots | 1 | Avoid hazards, -25% Damage from fire |
| Rare Artifact | HP | ARM | CAP | STR | MAG | SKL | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Excalibur | 8 | 3 | 4 | -25% Dark resist | |||
| Dragonslayer | 2 | 2 | +50% Damage against dragons | ||||
| Refuge | 3 | 2 | 2 | +20% Healing in combat | |||
| Obsidian Arquebus | -10 | -2 | 4 | 3 | -2 | +20% Damage from wall to non wall | |
| Grandmaster Spellbook | -10 | 2 | -12 | 10 | 8 | ||
| Imperial Battle Armor | 6 | -3 | |||||
| Kesh’s Toolkit | 2 | Melee can attack up walls | |||||
| Cloak of Cunning | 3 | -2 | -2 | Greatly reduce chance of crits | |||
| Essence of Embor | 3 | Inflict chill on enemy squad at start of battle |
| Epic Artifact | HP | ARM | CAP | STR | MAG | SKL | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sin Credo | 2 | Leader gets extra attack Followers damage reduced by 25% | |||||
| Eskander’s Karambit | 5 | 4 | Squad can ambush | ||||
| Ataraxia | -5 | 2 | 4 | ||||
| Heart Seeker | -50 | 4 | 7 | -20 | Archery ignores wall, woods defenses | ||
| Blood Staff | -50 | 5 | 16 | ||||
| Cyrene’s Regalia | 48 | 5 | 8 | +25% Dark resist | |||
| Donar’s Treatise of War | 1 | Double XP, CP from combat | |||||
| Obsidian Plate Armor | 60 | 10 | 3 | -15 | |||
| St Teresa’s Bulwark | 20 | 4 | 2 | 4 | Front row takes -25% damage | ||
| Boots of Tyranny | 2 | +2 movement, morale reduced | |||||
| Imperial War Banner | -4 | ||||||
| Everlasting Potion | 2 | One free heal per battle | |||||
| Landis’s Fixed Dice | 2 | Double item drop rate from battles | |||||
| Black Belt | 2 | +25% damage on defense | |||||
| Belinda’s Field Kit | 3 | Squad heals 10% on player phase |
| Legendary Artifact | HP | ARM | CAP | STR | MAG | SKL | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Balmung | -46 | 8 | 3 | 8 | 6 | 24 | |
| Fang of Duros | 60 | -10 | 5 | 20 | -500 | ||
| Genbu Shell Fragment | 25 | 3 | Immune to critical hits, -1 movement | ||||
| Landis’s Mirage | -60 | 5 | -35% Damage from archery and firearms | ||||
| Soha’s Blood Shard | 5 | 15 | 15 | Gain HP from kills Take 10% HP damage per phase | |||
| St Teresa’s Tiara | 4 | 20 | Gain STR for every point of MAG, MAG set to 0 | ||||
| Skull of Rowdain | -20 | -8 | 4 | -8 | -8 | -8 | Squad is locked at fearful morale Defeated enemies surrender if able |
| Jade Figurine | 4 | 33% chance of second turn | |||||
| Iblis Family Signet | 120 | 5 | +5% Hit and evasion for entire army while squad is deployed | ||||
| Temporal Modulator | 5 | Attack first when defending Does not work when ambushed Only works three times per phase | |||||
| Ace of Spades | 5 | All squads on all teams within 3 tiles take +15% damage |
Squad Defining Artifacts
Temporal Modulator
Attacking first on defense is extremely powerful, even with the limit of three combats per phase. That limitation can be dealt with via knowledge of the enemy AI (targets lowest threat) and positioning to reduce the number of enemies that can reach the modulator squad.
A typical modulator squad is offensively focused with the goal of wiping the enemy before they can attack. To accomplish this you will want a mix of class types to ensure that you don’t waste all your damage overkilling the enemy front line. See squad building for more detailed possibilities for this and the other squad defining artifacts.
Skull of Rowdain
The skull is a significant tactical disadvantage (fearful is pretty bad on top of all the attribute penalties) but provides a huge boost to gold income and technology advancement by increasing surrenders. It enables killing half a squad/leader while getting surrenders for those kills, which should enable the next squad to force surrender the remaining enemy. Thus you end up with close to 100% surrenders when you can initiate combat with the skull & follow up effectively.
I have settled into three main ways to use the skull:
- Offensive player phase squad that focuses on destroying the enemy before it can be damaged
- Defensive enemy phase squad that aims to kill enough of the enemy to allow force surrender
- Combine it with modulator to focus on pure offense and kill 3 enemy squads on defense
I would recommend starting with approach 1 and then experimenting with the other two. If you are committing to using it against a lot of foes, it can also be helpful to bring more healers in adjacent squads to support the skull squad or even a dedicated support healing squad.
Sin Credo
This artifact is perfect for Beatrix: her squad is mostly about her anyway, with her low leadership and high personal damage to all enemies. Sin Credo lets her go all in on that & the rest of her squad can be defensive and healing focused. Alternatively use bloodlust on flying dragons to keep them healed up.
Diana can also make good use of this with her second form & ranged attack, but her leadership usually skyrockets for me, so the penalty hits a lot harder for her larger squad.
St Teresa’s Tiara
Typically I would add a few paladins or valkyries to a squad to anchor anti magic defenses with a splash of healing, but tiara changes them into pure damage instead. It stacks beautifully with arcane might, vigor and skill (the traits applies before Tiara’s conversion) and other +magic artifacts, so try and add something like Excalibur or Balmung that gives both strength and magic. It does not apply before arcane barrier, which makes that trait useless with Tiara. Diana also has a huge magical stat, so she can lead up the tiara squad.
The big downside is that their healing will be reduced to a tiny amount & thus their second action will be fairly useless if the squad is damaged. This can be mitigated by nuking the enemy and not getting significantly damaged!
Another downside is that the classes that benefit the most all attack at the same time. Thus you need some characters that go before heavies, like swordmasters or assasins to attack the back row. These classes won’t benefit from the magic -> strength conversion as much.
Other Notable Artifacts
Kesh’s Toolkit
Kesh’s Toolkit is a pretty unique way to deal with enemy squads on walls & can be very helpful if your archer squads can’t be risked shooting up. You’ll want to swap this into a squad for a level with tons of walls rather than having them use it all the time though. Flying dragon squads will achieve this in a more flexible way, but won’t be available until fairly late game.
Landis’s Mirage, Hulking Pavise
Defense against firearms is extremely useful in a few key stages & these two artifacts are some of the best ways to gain it. Landis’s Mirage looks like it’d be counterproductive with the -60 hp, but if you combo it with other damage reduction sources it will be quite worth it.
St Teresa’s Bulwark, Officer’s Regalia
Speaking of other sources of damage reduction, these two combo very nicely and with one of the firearms reduction artifacts. Using all three can make a squad incredibly resilient to gunfire & even cannons, provided some healing.
Everlasting Potion
Great for survival in healer-less squads like pure archers or light ambush squads.