To foster effective teamwork within your party, it’s essential to understand and connect with your companions. This principle is equally applicable in real life and in the game Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma, which features a diverse and expansive cast.
By developing relationships with your party members, you may even uncover the potential for romantic connections. It’s important to note that the game tracks “Bond Level”and “Intimacy”as two distinct metrics.
Moreover, pursuing romance with one NPC does not restrict the benefits gained from high Bond Levels with other eligible characters. However, before diving into romance, it is crucial to build friendships first.Here’s a detailed guide on nurturing bonds with your party members in Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma.
Strengthening Your Bonds
Bond Levels for characters improve through various social interactions, adventures, and by completing specific quests related to them. Each Bond Level increase rewards you uniquely depending on the character, while all party members follow similar patterns for unlocking new interaction options.
For instance, reaching Bond Level 6 yields the “Cooking Together”option. This feature highlights certain recipes with a chef’s hat icon in the cooking menu. Cooking these dishes with a character typically results in the creation of potent consumables.
Engage in Daily Interactions
Your primary social action is to converse with party members. Selecting “Let’s Chat”for the first time with an NPC nudges you closer to the next Bond Level.
Fortunately, chatting does not consume in-game time, allowing you to interact with every character, even during your busiest days. However, there’s a drawback—no system indicates which characters you’ve already spoken with, leading to potential redundant checks throughout long days.
Additionally, your first Sacred Treasure, the Plum Branch, provides a slight increase to Bond Levels each time you utilize it near a character. This action costs 2 RP and can be performed once per day for each NPC. Therefore, it is efficient to combine chatting with Plum Branch usage while making your rounds!
Quality Time Together
The “Let’s Hang Out”option offers a simple way to elevate a party member’s Bond Level. By selecting this, you’ll be presented with four activity suggestions for the day. When you haven’t done this before, a yellow icon will appear above the NPC when you pass by.
Engaging in hang-out activities always costs in-game time, which varies based on the selected action:
| Time | Example Activities |
|---|---|
| 10 minutes | Telling a joke, making small talk |
| 30 minutes | Going for a walk, giving a gift |
| 60 minutes | Going out to eat, taking a nap |
If you’ve engaged in activities with a character before, the game displays their preference through icons representing Loved, Liked, Disliked, or Hated.(There’s no representation for neutral preferences.)
Opting for longer or higher-tier activities generally rewards you with more points towards your Bond Level, though this is significantly outperformed by selecting the character’s preferred activities. For example, engaging in a Loved 10-minute activity yields more progress than a neutral 60-minute task. Conversely, activities against an NPC’s preferences result in point loss.
Dining at Iroha’s Teahouse or Yachiyo’s Izakaya often proves to be a universally accepted choice, making it a reliable option even though it costs 60 minutes.
The “Give a Gift”option always remains available when spending time together. The reaction of the party member will depend on the nature of the gift. Observing NPC dialogues can provide useful hints regarding their preferences, often shared indirectly through conversations with other characters.
Once you’ve given a character a Loved, Liked, Disliked, or Hated item, it’s documented in the Profiles section of your menu. The accent icons will help you remember your previous gift choices when interacting with that character again. Similar to engaging in activities, gifting Disliked or Hated items can also lead to a decrease in Bond Points.
As you progress through the game’s main story and advance your Social Activities skill, you’ll unlock new hang-out options. If a character’s Bond Level is low, avoid selecting higher-level activities, as this may result in scolding and progress loss. This aspect can be somewhat complicated if your options are mainly higher-level activities.
However, when starting new relationships at Bond Level 0, there are no zero-level activities available, so you can safely choose a level-one activity, including gifting.
Perks in the Social Activities tree allow you to refresh your hang-out options. Keep in mind these refreshes occur daily and apply to all characters collectively, so use them judiciously. I typically refresh to uncover lower-tier activities for newly established relationships.
Fostering Exploration Bonds
Your bond with party members gradually improves as you explore the lands of Azuma. While the growth may seem minimal at first, it becomes significant over time.
Each time your party members engage in dialogue during explorations, you’ll receive notifications regarding their bond improvements. Selecting characters who engage in conversation together, like Iroha and Ulalaka, enhances your growth rate. When one character triggers dialogue, both characters benefit from the Bond Level increase.
An Options menu feature labeled “Party Chatter”lets you control the frequency of these conversations. I haven’t rigorously tested this feature, but it seems that maintaining a “Normal”setting boosts exploration-related bond growth.
After completing the Winter Region, your active party size can increase to six characters. However, remember that only the characters in your active party will trigger bonding conversations, so rotating them frequently can help maximize their bond potential.
Engaging in Personal Requests
Alongside the generic requests found on the Ema Board, each NPC offers Personal Requests that yield village experience points and contribute to bond growth. Additionally, completing these requests rewards you with gold and items.
Personal Requests are numbered, but they are not sequential in nature. For instance, receiving “Ulalaka’s Request 6″doesn’t imply you’ve missed earlier quests. Each character has an array of over a dozen potential Personal Requests, and even repeated quests continue to offer rewards.
It’s important to note that NPCs do not always have Personal Requests ready. These requests arise over time and can only be discarded using the “Give Up”option when necessary.
Unfortunately, you cannot tell which NPC has a new Personal Request available without exploring and asking around the village.
Unlocking Bonding Quests
As you boost your Bond Level, you will unlock a series of “Getting to Know So-And-So”quests known as Bonding Quests. These require a specific Bond Level to initiate, with some quests demanding additional prerequisites.
| Quest Number | Required Bond Level |
|---|---|
| 1 | 4 |
| 2 | 5 |
| 3 | 6 |
| 4 | 7 |
Generally speaking, Bonding Quests demand minimal effort on your part. These quests serve as story rewards for establishing stronger relationships with your party members, often depicting the NPC in the midst of a personal dilemma that the Earthdancer assists them in overcoming. Typically, these quests involve carrying out straightforward tasks, like collecting certain resources.
For example, one of the quests for Matsuri requires you to finish the Winter Region due to a crucial character interaction that occurs in the main storyline afterward. This setup paves the way for a conflict in her later Bonding Quests, leading to an intense rematch with the boss from the Summer Region.
It’s noteworthy that rather than increasing your Bond Level, Bonding Quests contribute to your Intimacy with a character. This metric is tracked separately and reaching Bond Level 7 allows you to complete a character’s fourth Bonding Quest and opens the door to romance.
While the romance arcs may not be as intense as those found in some other games, they still provide an enjoyable layer of motivation for those willing to cultivate relationships throughout the game.
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