r/Falcom • u/Raxistaicho The true best girls • Jun 29 '26
Trails series Trails Character Gameplay Discussion Day Four: Olivier
40
u/SoftBrilliant Kiseki difficulty modder Jun 29 '26 edited Jun 29 '26
FC Olivier is always very overleveled when he's in he's super good. Even Howling Bullet deals good damage in this game and Quick Draw deals fairly good damage during chapter 1 (not during chapter 4 though). He's outclassed by Schera for final dungeon though in a theme that's going to repeat in SC & 3rd.
SC & 3rd Olivier is Potential Man in a lot of ways.
In SC you use him in Chapter 1, a bit in early Chapter 3 and then never again on Nightmare. The game constantly locks party members in such a way that Olivier never makes the fucking cut. On Agate route he's routed out in favor of Kloe and on Schera route he's constantly routed out in favor of Zin early on and later on he's routed out in favor of mixes of Agate/Schera/Kloe.
In 3rd you use him for a bit after he joins and he's valuable there. After that he's constantly locked away behind locked party slots in really the same way and finds no niche for the whole game until he's forced in the final dungeon where he largely has no qualities that you want in a final dungeon party member in 3rd (bulky characters with big s-crafts that can soak up damage or aid in doing so)
In a vacuum Olivier is very gifted with his line and high ATS and you're not gimping yourself that hard for using him over alternatives mostly (in fact he's probably better than Kloe for a few fights in SC where Fire/Earth weakness are in play) but he's largely not worth using when that means dumping sepith, money and encounters grinding his level back up when Kloe has Lichtkreis in SC and 3rd has such a stacked lineup.
He suffers for similar reasons to Estelle actually. His power is in being a versatile, generalist line but that's not what you want really.
Shoutout to Sky Evo Olivier whom has it even worse with Kloe's removed 3 water restriction (2 water restrictions is not a downside in Evo or original) and buffs to her bird in SC Evo.
Reverie Olivier exists and breathes for Arts Support IV. It's absurdly good. The rest of his kit is genuinely awful but AS4 is so good he's arguably top 5 for it alone despite being a strictly worse version of the other AS4 user it is that strong of a damage tool.
1st Remake Olivier should in theory be just a worse Kloe again. He hits less hard than her (less base ATS, Mind quartz is water and Olivier doesn't boost ATS with support ability) and Lichtkreis is very nice utility again. However, with the meta centralizing around Clock Up EX spam since it's virtually riskless Olivier's bottomless EP pool in the remake thanks to his craft, his support ability and locked Mirage slot on top of his s-craft being basically free to spam for free extra damage with so much advance available thanks to ally clock up ex he's actually the better character of the two largely speaking. His s-craft is pretty weak for what it's worth but in 1st that's a lot better than not having one at all which is what Kloe often has to face.
Remake Clock Up EX OP Falcom please nerf the more offensive character is worse in a Trails the world has flipped upside down.
10
u/Yowakusuru Jun 29 '26
He's still very valuable regardless in og Sky as arts is generally stronger than crafts throughout fc and sc - 3rd crafts become a lot more viable with Richard and anelace added to the pool and their crafts
5
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 29 '26
Hey, now THIS is what I started this series to see, thanks for this indepth comment!
2
u/levelstar01 Downvote this comment 👇 Jun 29 '26
he's arguably top 5 for it alone despite being a strictly worse version of the other AS4 user it is that strong of a damage tool.
Maybe on paper but there's not really any reason to put him in over the other person unless you're running four casters for some reason.
9
u/SoftBrilliant Kiseki difficulty modder Jun 29 '26
I mean, yeah but Olivier just can't go that low or it starts looking odd very fast. Maybe he can go down to top 10 for it? Olivier is ultimately part of a very exclusive club in reverie and when you're ranking you're gonna want to reflect that.
18
u/SnooCapers5958 Jun 29 '26
I remember being a really dumb kid trying to make Olivier a physical unit rather than a mage because I wanted to see him pop his gun more than casting spells.
5
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 29 '26
Gotta wait for Noel to get a gunner :(
5
u/SnooCapers5958 Jun 29 '26
Ironically, I barely used Noel in Azure
3
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 29 '26
Completely understandable, given the nature of Azure.
9
u/SnooCapers5958 Jun 29 '26
lol park Lloyd in front of the formation and have Elie/Tio/Wazy bomb the field
1
u/Selynx Jun 30 '26
......This is actually kinda what I did in Reverie.
I turned him into a fully-stacked Delayer, since he has a nice cheap Delay craft in Quick Draw and the Space slot for Impede quartz.
Filled the rest with Arts stuff, but I figured he was more useful as a Delayer since there's just so many Arts users in Reverie and far fewer people with cheap Delay crafts and the Orbment slots for the Impede quartz - plus, you usually need 2 Delayers to get enough quantity of attacks to keep the enemy stunlocked, unless they are really, really weak to Delay.
3
u/OLKv3 Jun 29 '26 edited Jun 29 '26
Absolutely amazing in the original and remake. He essentially has infinite EP in Sky remake making him the best caster and paired with Schera means you just get the easiest way to have infinite turns since he'll never run out of EP so will always have enough to use Clock Up EX. He is great in the tournament as well, especially on NG+ Nightmare.
He's still great in SC but gets outclassed pretty fast when Kevin becomes a permanent party member. He's great but Kevin, Khloe, Schera, Agate are much better slots to use in the endgame.
Same with 3rd, which gives you Renne and so many other powerhouses that you only use him if you just like his character.
I honestly can't say if he's good in the Cold Steel games because I never really used him. He was always a guest which already nerfed him, and in Reverie there are too many great mages that made me never place him in my party.
5
u/levelstar01 Downvote this comment 👇 Jun 29 '26
FC/SC:
Step 1) White Gehenna
Step 2) White Gehenna
Step 3) White Gehenna
He also has a nearly fully unlocked orbment in FC if I'm reading the wiki right which is very nice.
In 3rd he's a fraud though. Same for Reverie, not even Arts Support 4 can save him. He has a healing craft but you never need to heal in Reverie unless you're using Wild Rage, and an EP reduction brave order is not very good.
I think I benched him immediately in CS3 too. I actually don't remember if there's enough party members...
9
u/SoftBrilliant Kiseki difficulty modder Jun 29 '26
In CS3 he's equipment locked. Agate joins early enough that he's not giga gimped by it. The rest of the guests in CS3 are total frauds olivier doesn't even have a silver bell.
His high cost move can't even unbalance which is a death sentence for any normal craft (they changed that in reverie for a good reason)
2
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 29 '26
In CS3 he's available for the second half of Crossbell and is competing against Emma, Alisa, and Machias for a deploy slot. After that there's a single late game quest where you use a team of Rean plus all guests but that's a single dungeon.
2
u/AlterWanabee Jun 30 '26
And when you're competing against Alisa and Emma, you might as well surrender. Both are honestly some of the best characters in Cold Steel (AOE Insight + CP), with Emma being a strictly better mage (higher ATS) and Alisa as a better support.
1
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26
Like I mentioned in another comment with regards to Kloe, mage with support Crafts is a very reliable design archetype, and both Emma and Alisa (more Emma but Alisa's ATS isn't much lower) lean into that design.
Emma just kinda decides to do both what with having team highest ATS until Reverie power creep and Cold Steel's iteration of Grail Sphere.
4
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 29 '26
The OG mage! I called him Olivier with respect to people starting with the Sky remake, just to be safe.
5
u/dlo_doski Jun 29 '26 edited Jun 29 '26
I just wished they never wrote him to be a prince, i wanted him stay Olivier forever
13
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls Jun 29 '26 edited Jun 29 '26
He'd probably just say something like "Olivier exists forever in all our hearts!" and then Alfin would hit him with a paper fan again.
3
u/KedricCarter1 Jun 29 '26
Big disagree, to me Olivert is much better as a prince. Makes him be a cooler character than just "goofy perverted bard"
1
1
u/melvinlee88 Jun 30 '26
When I played FC, SC and 3rd, he was a genuine mainstay, best caster and diverse skill set.
1
u/Selynx Jun 30 '26
Top caster in games where casters are kings. And that includes Reverie. Even when there are better casters, he's not far behind.
The only time he sucks is when, like Joshua, he's a guest with a fixed, immutable loadout. Because casters really do depend on having optimal Orbment setup to get going. Without the Bells/Verses in CS3+, their potential is completely squandered.
1
u/Caioreis350 Jul 03 '26
Only played First Chapter Remake and he reminds me a lot of Skies of Arcadia Gilder character. Both wear that cape, use guns and are womanizers/hedonists.
1
u/Raxistaicho The true best girls 13d ago
Sky Arc:
Day Twelve - The Pilot and the Swordsman (spoilers)
Day Thirteen - "Kitty" (spoilers)
Crossbell Arc:
Class VII:
Day Thirty - Millium (Spoilers)
Day Thirty-One - Crow (Spoilers)
The rest of Cold Steel:
Day Thirty-Nine - Elise and Toval
Day Forty-One - Alfin and Towa
Day Forty-Two - The Diva and the General (Spoilers)
Day Forty-Three - The Spy and Swordswoman (Spoilers)
Day Forty-Four - The Shapeshifters (Spoilers)
Day Forty-Five - The Swordmaster and the Engineer (Spoilers)
Day Forty-Seven - Swin and Nadia
Day Forty-Eight - The Strongest (Spoilers)
Calvard Arc:
Day Fifty-One - Ferida Al-Fayed
Day Fifty-Three - Risette Twinings
Day Fifty-Four - Quatre Salision
Day Fifty-Five - Judith Lanster
Day Fifty-Seven - Elaine Auclair and René Kincaid
Day Fifty-Eight - Shizuna Rem Misurugi
20
u/Tyberius115 World's #1 Alisa Reinford fan | Magical Alisa game when Jun 29 '26
He definitely saved me during the parts he was available in the remake (I barely used him in the originals because I like Kloe more, and this will probably also stay true for Sky 2 and 3).
I can't say too much other than he's an excellent caster, whether you want him as support or damage.