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(Re)introducing Welch Vineyard
Unlocking Your First Item Creation Category
Further Demands
Longtime fans of Star Ocean often recite fond memories of Star Ocean 2: The Second Story's approach to item creation. Characters started off with set talents, and you could more or less get going with plenty of different categories of crafting from the jump. It was a bit more complicated, but not by much.
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In Star Ocean: The Divine Force, the increasingly ever-present franchise mascot Welch Vineyard must be consulted in order to gradually unlock each category. Her needs must be sated on a regular basis, or no item creation for you. Here's when, where, and how you'll fulfill each request.
(Re)introducing Welch Vineyard
The eccentric inventor and merchant extraordinaire, the one and only Welch Vineyard, is effectively Star Ocean: The Divine Force's very conduit to item creation. At predetermined points in the story, she will contact your lead character (either Raymond or Laeticia), summoning them back to her oddly humble abode in Delryk Village to complete requests for her.
That said, players must be a touch proactive about visiting her, or else they won't be locked out of the quests, per se, but rather, they'll needlessly delay unlocking one of The Divine Force's most important gameplay mechanics.
Welch's introduction cutscene at the Seaport of Rythal is unavoidable for a reason — when she drops her ring, and the protagonist realizes where she resides, this is the game's equivalent of grabbing a loudspeaker, broadcasting the significance of this technically-optional content.
Therefore, you should be sure to fast travel back to Delryk Village immediately (and hey, you were headed there, anyway). Welch's house is on the upper level of this impressively vertical town; it's the one with the massive gloved hand and the finger pointing right at it. The woman has very likely never even heard the word subtle.
Unlocking Your First Item Creation Category
Upon your arrival, Welch will decide you're just the right servant for the job, and task you with something the script doesn't actually specify. Thankfully, the quest screen does. You'll need three Roly-Poly Beans.
There's a darn fine chance you've got plenty more than three. If you've been poking around in the overworld regions, grabbing every glowing green item you can find, you're likely golden. Of course, we don't want to assume as much. Maybe you just happened to miss the Roly-Poly Beans.
In which case, though you can find them in multiple spots, we recommend you head to the region between the forest where Ray's pod crashes and the first village in the game, AKA the Larcasse Region. As Star Ocean: The Divine Force's introduction to its wide-open areas, it's a straightforward map.
The only deviation from its north-south trajectory, as you'll note (or have already noted), is to the east about midway up. You might have poked around far to the edge of this eastern sprawl already, bumping into a big rock golem called the Mudman, and depending on how you fared at the time, you may also be prone to nightmares upon bumping into him again. By now, however, he ought to be a cinch.
Not that you necessarily must engage him. The Roly-Poly Beans most commonly seem to sprout in the wooded areas on the perimeter of the eastern area, and the Mudman's more toward the center field. Snag a trio of them and fast-travel back to Delryk.
As a reward for your due diligence, albeit with the caveat that you were somehow late — even if you hand the darn beans to her five seconds after getting the quest — Welch teaches the first category of item creation, Compounding. From this point forward, you can combine items, especially healing items, to create more effective potions and the like. Good stuff.
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Further Demands
Let's call a spade a spade; these aren't requests, they're demands.
So long as you complete Welch's initial quest immediately, further quests will pop up via the communicator she hands you from thereon out, until you have unlocked all seven of Star Ocean: The Divine Force's item creation categories. The second is 'Welch the Crafter', and you can five Fresh Sage for dirt cheap from merchants.
Something we've been noticing is that a few players have mentioned these Welch quests in separate orders. We find it sort of hard to believe, but perhaps they're unlocked in a random order. If this happens to you, just know they'll eventually all trigger; do let us know if so!
The third, 'Welch the Smithy', is a bit costly; if you need to purchase all ten Silver, it will run you about 4,000 Fol. 'Welch the Engineer' finds our strange lass in need of a pair of 'Claidheamh Soluis'. If you've been leveling Smithy, you may have a stock of these. We've found they start to appear around Level Three. If not, you can buy them at Delryk.
'Welch the Alchemist' ties into shop delivery quests; turn in an ample supply of wanted materials, and her 'Electromagnet Bombs' will pop up. As with the Silver, you may have some of these, if not all, from the green items in the field. What are bombs doing out here...?
Next up, at least probably, is 'Welch the Author', in which ten Mithril are mandatory. It's best to craft these if you can, though they can be purchased for over a thousand Fol apiece in towns around this point in the game. And lastly, there's 'Welch the Synthesizer', This one's surprisingly simple. The quintet of Fire Incantations can be bought for cheap. Honestly, Welch, just do it yourself for once.
Next: Star Ocean: The Divine Force - Private Actions Guide
