Biomotor Unitron Weapons and Tactics FAQ v 1.1 by Kendrick Kerwin Chua (kendrick@io.com) Last revision 10/18/99 Biomotor Unitron is a copyrighted property and trademark of Yumekobo Co. Ltd. Neo Geo Pocket is a registered trademark of SNK corporation of America. The author respects all property ownership and intends no infringement or unauthorized usage thereof. All text copyright 1999 by Kendrick Kerwin Chua, except material which is attributed or quoted from original sources. This text contains a mechanism to detect unauthorized usage of its contents. Please do not use or otherwise distribute the contents of this text without express written permission from the author. This information is provided as-is, with no guarantee implied or given. Neither the author of this document nor the companies named above may be held responsible for any action taken as a result of this information. This document best viewed in a fixed-width, non-proportional font. **NEW - Weapons list now completed. Check out the Demon Sword, a monster weapon with 400 Attack points. I. Introduction II. Glossary of terms III. Table of weapons and attributes IV. Tactics and strategy when choosing weapons V. Optimizing development VI. Credits and revision history I. Introduction Biomotor Unitron is the first RPG for the Neo Geo Pocket Color, an obscure portable game console only recently made available in the United States. The maiden voyage by developer Yumekobo enters the American market with a pretty addictive variation on the dueling monster game. Although it's not innovative in its graphics or its gameplay, the design is sufficiently deep to entertain both casual gamers and more obsessive RPG players. A Usenet denizen calling himself Faust (kmfdm@technonet.com) first put together a FAQ covering the game in general back in May of 1999, when Biomotor Unitron was available only as an import title. His FAQ provided translations from Japanese as well as a complete guide to basic gameplay. The intent of THIS document is to focus specifically on the development and choice of weapons, which to me is the main draw of the game. Faust's FAQ is available at the Gamefaqs website at the following URL: (http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/neopocket/faq/bio_motor_unitron.txt) and should be considered the authoritative source. Unlike its predecessors Pokemon or Monster Rancher, statistics are not the only avenue of improvement for your surrogate warrior. Biomotor Unitron uses robots as its fighters, meaning that components may be swapped or replaced as required depending on the situation. It entirely possible to rely on a single set of weapons and accessories and fight your way through the game by way of brute force. However, I believe it is much more rewarding to carefully consider your choice of weapons and accessories. This also results in faster completion of the game, and less time spent in tedious battles. The Arena battles and the five Dungeon areas each contain unique enemies denoted by their elemental aspect. Although it is much more complicated than the 'Rock, Scissors, Paper' game on which it is based, the end results are essentially the same. II. Glossary of terms Skip this section if you are already familiar with basic gameplay in Biomotor Unitron. All monsters and piloted robots in Biomotor Unitron may be identified in part or in whole by an elemental aspect. Each aspect determines a numerical advantage or disadvantage in battle. The HELP option in the game identifies these aspects as follows: Fire: Advantage over wood, weak against water Wind: Advantage over water, weak against earth Wood: Advantage over earth, weak against fire Water: Advantage over fire, weak against wind Earth: Advantage over wind, weak against wood Light: Advantage over none, weak against none Dark: Advantage over all, weak against light Mirror: No advantage or weakness These aspects are stored in the main body of the Unitron and in each of its arms. Monsters tend to exhibit only one aspect. It is possible for a Unitron to exhibit contradictory aspects depending on what equipment it is carrying. Put simply, the weapon you choose will either help or hurt your progress through a dungeon area or against an Arena opponent. For example, you may find that the OGRE weapon is very effective in the Windy Ruins dungeon. But when you enter the Forest or Verdure, your weapon will inflict one/fourth of that damage. For this reason it is necessary to return to the city and swap weaponry depending on what type of opponent you are facing. Weapons not only have elemental aspect status but modify the statistics of your Unitron as well. For reference, here are the stats as given on page sixteen of the Biomotor Unitron manual. HP - Hit points. The Unitron is destroyed if HP reaches zero EP - Energy points. Attacks use EP like fuel, and at different rates AP - Attack points. These are further separated by left hand and right hand SP - Defense points. The higher the SP, the less damage is received RP - Agility points. This affects ability to hit, and ability to dodge MP - Movement points. This determines who attacks first in battle Any weapon may be able to increase any of these statistics when equipped. III. Table of weapons and attributes The following table lists almost every weapon which can be bought or developed in Biomotor Unitron. Their elemental aspect and additive effect on statistics is given in a tabular format. Again, elemental aspect has a multiplicative effect on damage done against a weaker element. Also, damage done may be cut to one-half or one-fourth against a stronger element. I've just completed this table by going back to one of my old save files and playing my way through the last dungeon to collect some of the more rare development metals. Look for Demon and Ashra down below. Demon is of particular interest, since it adds 400 AP to your Unitron. Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP BtFist Fire 15 15 15 PwrHnd Fire 30 30 30 ArmHnd Fire 60 60 60 SlkHnd Wood 15 15 15 OakHnd Wood 30 30 30 Crssbw Wood 60 60 60 H-gun Water 15 15 15 IceBlw Water 30 30 30 Hydro Water 60 60 60 Hawk Air 15 15 15 AirHnd Air 30 30 30 Killer Air 60 60 60 Ogre Earth 15 15 15 Golem Earth 30 30 30 Giant Earth 60 60 60 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Magma Fire 40 5 7 Binder Fire 10 40 40 Hammer Fire 40 10 40 Pliers Fire 80 40 60 Blade Fire 40 70 70 Driver Fire 40 40 10 Drill Fire 70 70 40 GrvHmr Light 120 140 40 Cutter Dark 60 120 120 3DDrvr Air 80 110 110 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Rapier Air 15 20 10 Sabre Air 30 40 20 Dirk Air 30 20 40 Sabre+ Air 60 40 80 Gradus Air 60 80 40 Gram Wood 100 100 100 Lavatn Fire 100 140 60 Wyndia Air 80 80 140 Demon Dark 100 400 50 Crsadr Light 100 175 175 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP HndAxe Fire 25 15 5 BtlAxe Fire 40 35 15 TomHwk Fire 30 45 15 2Edge Fire 60 90 30 Break Earth 120 150 30 BllArm Earth 25 10 10 MgaBll Earth 50 20 20 NoWire Earth 20 20 50 Crushr Earth 120 60 60 Sthrn+ Light 60 60 120 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Lancer Earth 5 25 15 DrlArm Earth 10 50 30 Pierce Earth 10 60 20 Trnado Air 30 90 60 Spiral Water 75 150 75 Hook Wood 20 15 10 LogHk Wood 40 30 20 BtlHk Wood 80 60 40 IceClw Water 150 90 60 DvlClw Dark 150 90 60 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Whip Air 5 20 20 Whip+ Air 10 40 40 FBoot Fire 20 80 80 9-Tail Air 20 80 80 EBoot Air 20 80 80 Fork Water 21 12 12 HKClaw Water 20 20 5 Tridnt Water 40 25 25 WlfClw Wood 40 40 10 TgrClw Air 80 80 20 Disc Air 20 5 20 SpikeD Air 30 20 40 RingD Air 40 10 40 Disc+ Air 60 40 80 AirD Air 80 20 80 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP EWire Wood 20 20 5 ArmWre Wood 30 50 10 Tangle Wood 40 40 10 Lghtng Wood 60 100 20 Coil Wood 130 120 50 Mage Wood 10 5 10 10 10 Wizard Wood 20 10 20 20 20 Warlok Wood 40 20 40 40 40 ArchMg Wood 50 50 30 50 60 60 GodHnd Light 75 80 40 75 90 90 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Skull Dark 10 15 20 DgnHed Earth 15 35 40 DrkClw Dark 20 30 40 Cursed Earth 30 70 80 Infrno Dark 40 120 140 Spring Water 5 35 5 Curler Water 20 60 10 Snaker Water 10 70 10 Zoomer Water 30 120 30 Buster Earth 50 200 50 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Claw Earth 5 20 20 Triger Earth 20 40 40 Qatar Earth 20 80 80 Indra Air 50 125 125 Agni Fire 50 125 125 Maxi Water 15 15 15 Twin Water 30 30 30 FPlse Fire 60 60 60 IcePls Water 60 60 60 Ashra Water 100 100 100 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Bazoka Fire 5 25 15 SDisc Fire 10 50 30 Chnsaw Fire 10 55 25 Saw Fire 20 110 50 Hacker Fire 40 180 80 Knukle Water 11 17 17 Gloves Water 10 10 70 Rocket Water 22 34 34 Mail Water 20 20 140 Plate Water 40 40 220 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Troopr Wood 5 30 10 Scorp Wood 10 60 20 Spider Wood 20 100 60 Mantis Wood 20 120 40 RedClw Wood 40 180 80 HndGun Water 15 30 Vulcan Water 30 60 Lncher Water 25 65 Gatling Water 40 140 Phalnx Water 30 150 Weapon Aspect HP EP AP SP RP MP Cannon Fire 5 40 2Barrl Fire 10 80 LineGn Fire 20 70 XGun Fire 20 160 RailGn Fire 20 280 Flint Wood 80 40 Sword Fire 60 60 Kama Air 50 50 TgrHnd Wood 20 50 50 MoleHd Earth 50 50 20 Stunr Water 60 60 Needle Air 60 60 Pole Earth 120 IV. Tactics and strategy when choosing weapons As stated before, it's advantageous to select a weapon based on the elemental aspects of your opponents. Put most simply, select arms which give you an advantage over your opponent by muliplying your attack potential. If you are fighting a Pumper (found in the Forest of Verdure) which is of the Wooden aspect, then you'll want to pick up a weapon with a Fire aspect, like the Chnsaw or the 2Barrl. When you start off the game, your Unitron will have two default arms which are usually offensive weapons. The attributes on these arms will typically add more Attack points and Hit points to your base Unitron. As you win money in battles, you'll want to upgrade your arms as well as other components. The higher your AP, the more damage you'll be able to dish out. This translates into higher Arena ranks and deeper dungeon levels. However, not all weapons are chosen for their offensive capability. You'll notice from the table that most weapons add a small amount to your Hit points, and slightly larger amounts to your Attack points and Defensive points. However, some weapons do little or nothing for your offensive capability, and may not add HP or AP at all. If you're going into an unfamiliar dungeon area for the first time, a weapon like Flint which raises HP and SP isn't a bad choice. Likewise, look at the Mail weapon, which adds very little to HP or AP but raises SP by 140. I've found that for the four regular dungeons (as opposed to the fifth secret dungeon) you should go with one offensive arm and one defensive arm. My favorite combination early in the game is 2Barrl on the right arm, and Warlok on the left arm. 2Barrl has a very high AP and will give you enough muscle to get past most monsters, whereas Warlok adds points to all your stats and makes you faster and smarter. As always, your mileage may vary. Experimentation is encouraged. V. Optimizing development The development of weapons is covered thoroughly in Faust's Unitron FAQ (http://www.gamefaqs.com/portable/neopocket/faq/bio_motor_unitron.txt) Again, his FAQ is the primary reference source on this game. I've purposely left development examples out of this document to encourage people to go and do it on their own. Suffice it to say that the big reason I put together this FAQ was because I wanted more hint as to what weapons were possible. Without spoiling too much of the story; it's necessary at several points in the game to have Light aspect weapons to combat enemies of Dark aspect. These weapons aren't available for purchase anywhere, and it was very difficult to develop them since metals and gems were very scarce. There are two things you can do to optimize your development ability. First off, continuously develop weapons even if you don't need them. Your technician's Development Level should be the same or higher than your Unitron pilot's level. If your tech is lagging, then you won't have the skills to consistently create the weaponry you need. Second, there's the old 'Saved Game' trick you can pull easily and repeatedly when developing weapons. If you pick up new materials and want to try them out, save your game first. Then, go and perform development repeatedly, writing down what weapons you're able to create and restoring your game after each successful development. Compare the stat improvements each weapon makes and select the one which fits your current need. VI. Credits and revision history 10/18/99 - Added Demon and Ashra to weapons list, completing it. 10/17/99 - Composed version 1.0 on a rainy afternoon after the hurricane. Two weapons missing from table, otherwise all information complete. Written by - Kendrick Chua (kendrick@io.com) With help from - Faust (kmfdm@technonet.com) Your name could appear here! If you spot any errors of fact or continuity, or have any other contribution, e-mail Kendrick at the address above. Future revisions will occur as appropriate. --EOF--