Unlike in past Atlus games, you're not actually going to need a guide for a lot of Metaphor: ReFantazio's side content. Persona fans will probably scoff at the very idea of not consulting a guide every five seconds to squeeze every drop of efficiency out of a 120-hour-long calendar simulator, but I swear it's true! A lot of the Follower-related stuff in Metaphor feels impossible to mess up, which absolutely wasn't the case in Personas 3, 4, and 5.
Just because that side of the game is easier doesn't mean Metaphor's a cakewalk though: You're still going to be stressing about getting everything done in time before the final credits roll, which is why I want to offer you some very specific early game tips—the stuff I realized was useful far, far too late into my own playthrough.
I made some silly mistakes during the first 20 or so hours in Metaphor, and I don't want you to repeat them. I also promise not to spoil a single thing in the process. Scout's honour.
Dungeons in Metaphor: ReFantazio are best cleared in a single day, so you can dedicate the time you've saved to other activities (like increasing Follower ranks). However, you're always going to run into the same issue when attempting to clear a dungeon in one go: you're gonna run out of MP. So this tip is a little bit of a two-for-one deal.
1. Don't use skills that restore your HP out of combat. Just stock up on a bunch of healing items instead.
2. Check in with merchants that sell MP restoring items every time you progress past a deadline. Although MP potions never seem to restock, after enough time some of them actually do. The Entero Water Shop in the Royal Capital is one such example, as the merchant there sells limited Fruit Cordials that restore 30 MP.
Once you progress the main story in the Royal Capital, you're going to want to start checking the podiums in whatever new city you're in every day. Occasionally one of your political rivals will be available to debate. These are ALWAYS worth doing, and they're missable if you progress the main story too far.
These debates offer you four incentives:
Plus, some of your political opponents are scumbags so it feels good to embarrass them in front of a big crowd.
I know this might sound like sacrilege to hardcore Persona fans, but hear me out. Almost every main dungeon is much harder than any available sidequest or bounty at that point in time, especially in the early game. Taking on sidequests and bounties beforehand will help you level up, find better weapons, and improve your Archetype skills in preparation to take down a main quest dungeon in a single day. Plus this will help you save MP and ensure that you can tackle a main quest dungeon in one shot, as your max MP increases when you level up.
Before you focus on any of your other Royal Virtues, get your Tolerance up to 2.
There's two reasons this is immediately beneficial. You need a 2 in Tolerance so you can purify items you have at the St. Fermis Church. Purified weapons and armour are some of the best equipment in the game and will definitely help you breeze through early game fights. For instance, purifying the Dragon's Indignation Greatsword (which you can get from defeating the optional Fire Dragon Mauna boss in the Nord Mines) prior to taking on the Catacomb dungeon makes the first main quest dungeon so much easier.
It's also important to improve it early so that you can progress what is arguably the most important Follower rank in Metaphor. Speaking of…
While it might not seem incredibly beneficial to progress Maria's ranks at first, her fourth and seventh ranks are extremely important to unlock as quickly as possible. Rank four nets you Speed Cooking, which will allow you to cook without progressing time, and Purpose, which increases the amount of EXP you receive after a battle. Rank seven rewards you with Chef's Chops and Burning Purpose, which are upgraded versions of Speed Cooking and Purpose. These are essential for anyone looking to min/max their adventure.
Upgrading the healer is necessary for completing More's quest, as he asks you to reach level 15 with the healer Archetype. But separate from that, it's also just one of the best Archetypes to max out in the early game. Having a skill that can heal all of your party members is essential, especially towards the end of the game. It's also immediately important however, as the majority of enemies in the first main dungeon are weak to both the healer's Archetype's light skills and its basic melee attacks.
And in case you weren't already convinced that progressing Maria's Follower rank is important, she's the one that helps you unlock the healer Archetype!
Money in Metaphor isn't hard to come by. You'll often find you have more than you need at any given time. This might lead you to spend frivolously. In the early game that won't cause you issues, but later on you'll start to notice that the best stuff suddenly costs an extortionate amount of money. For this reason, always try to make your big purchases on Idlesday. Almost every single merchant in the game offers a discount on this day of the week.
Even extremely expensive items will be cheaper, and it's the best time to stock up on loads of stuff like medicinal herbs, which will drop from 50 to 40 gold. You'll save 1,000 gold if you buy 100 of them on Idlesday vs. any other day of the week. Trust me when I say that you'll wish you'd been a bit more frugal once gear starts costing five figures in the endgame.
MAG is what you use for all your Archetype-related needs. Unlocking Archetypes and unlocking specific skills that you can then attach to Archetypes via skill inheritance costs MAG. When you start noticing that you're always earning more MAG than you're spending, it can be tempting to go hog wild with it—but much like money seeming to flow freely, this is a trap.
As you progress, Archetypes and skills will start to shoot up in price, and running out of MAG is basically a death sentence at certain points in the story. You will always want to keep a healthy reserve for emergencies, as several bosses (especially in the later main story missions) may require you to spend lots of MAG to create specific team compositions just so you can beat them. Use the Archetype-boosting seed items you find sparingly for exactly the same reason, as you never know when you might suddenly have to level up an Archetype you've never used before.
Also, just straight up ignore the fellas that offer to convert your MAG into money. Even with the increased rates of exchange on days with bad weather, this is never worth doing until the very, VERY end of the game.
If you take a single thing in this guide on board, let it be this: Get every single new party member's Follower rank up to 4 before travelling. Your party members' Follower ranks will always hit a roadblock.
This almost exclusively occurs at rank 4. Once this happens, to progress their Follower ranks any further you have to talk to them while you travel from one destination to another. If you don't know how to do that yet, don't worry, you'll unlock the option to do so early in the main story. Optimizing when you get past these Follower roadblocks is important because there will be extended periods of time where travelling is completely unnecessary, so you won't want to waste time needlessly doing so just to advance your party member's ranks.
This tip is subjective, but it's a way to make the game easier overall. Your protagonist is the only party member whose stats you can influence freely. For the most part, other members of your party are very much set in their ways. Strohl focuses on his attack stat when he levels up, Hulkenberg focuses on her endurance stat, Heismay focuses on agility, and so on. There are party members who you meet later that are magic stat orientated, but even knowing this ahead of time I'd still recommend you focus on improving your protag's magic.
Elemental-type damage is incredibly overpowered in Metaphor, especially once you start unlocking almighty-type skills (which ignore all resistances). Plus, mage-related Archetypes eventually learn skills that improve your maximum MP—which is obviously a huge deal for your protagonist, as he's the only party member you're always forced to use in combat. More magic, more MP, more power.
