Chained Echoes: Tomke, The Gourmand Guide

Chained Echoes Tomke, The Gourmand Guide: Stats & Build Suggestions. Also check; Chained Echoes Character Guide.

Chained Echoes: Tomke, The Gourmand

Tomke is the first optional character you can recruit, and you absolutely should. He is essentially a Final Fantasy Blue Mage, able to learn skills by literally eating his enemies (think Quina Quen from Final Fantasy IX). Tomke might look like a joke character, but he is loaded with utility. He is easily one of the best characters in the game, despite his somewhat goofy appearance.

He has surprisingly balanced stats across the board (even more than Glenn himself), meaning he can fill any role needed (tank, healer, physical attacker, magic attacker). I personally like to use him as a jack-of-all-trades, with a bit of everything.

Tomke starts with only one skill, Uncanny Encounter, which can only be used against enemies he can learn skills from. The game is nice enough to show a “Canned” box when you fight an enemy, so you’ll know that said enemy can be eaten. I recommend you check Jedo’s guide, where he shows which enemies can be canned and where to find them. Youtuber PrimeraEspada91 also made a three part video with a walkthrough showing how to get each skill (Part 1, Part 2, Part 3).

There is an exclusive accessory for Tomke called Can Machine, which allows him to eat enemies below 50% HP (as opposed to 25% / 30% / 40% from Uncanny Encounter).

Strengths

• Typical Blue Mage from Final Fantasy, learning skills from enemies
• Very balanced and above average stats.
• Abilities learned from enemies offer plenty of damage and utility.
• Flexibility makes him fit in any party setup.
• Has access to all the Killer passives that gives bonus damage against specific enemy types.

Weaknesses

• Uncanny Encounter can only be used.
• Very weak until learning more useful and powerful skills.
• Doesn’t have any passive skill that really stands out.

Canned

• Spinach Power: arguably his best skill. Casts Shield AND Aura on the entire party. I usually have him cast this right at the start and swap him for Victor.
• Sailor’s Song: his second best skill. Raises Ultra Bar by 30% (up tp 50% when maxed). Can only be used once per battle.
• Sharing is Caring: grants a random amount of TP to the ally. Very RNG based. You’ll either get next to nothing or fully restore the ally’s TP.
• Broken Accordion: has one of the highest damage multipliers in the game (x4, up to 4.4 when maxed); damage scales the lower Tomke’s HP is. Great when used in tandem with Silver Lining.
• Sacrifice: kills Tomke for reviving the whole party. It’s a situational panic button in case things go south.

Class Abilities

• Ether Sucker: from Vampire. Useful on all characters, period. Tomke will rarely run out of TP, though.
• Drunken Master: from Monk. Works fine equipped on any character as a pretty decent filler ability.
• Heal All: from Cleric. This allows Tomke to fulfill a niche of emergency healer since has a pretty high MND.
• Magic Smash / Physical Wonder: from Mage Warrior. Since Tomke has pretty balanced and above average ATK and MAG, these skills can actually hit pretty hard when used by him.

Crystals

• HP / DEF / MND Up: Tomke has pretty decent defensive stats, so pumping more just further reinforces it.
• Status Extender: not much to say. Just to make him keep enemies debuffed.
• HP Drain: very straightforward. Hit enemy, get HP. The amount seems to scale with damage done, so the harder you hit, the more you heal. Useful on pretty much all characters.

Focus on Tomke’s status and always save enough points to learn his skills as you can enemies. Given his balanced stats, there is no priority, just focus on whatever you want him to be.

As for Class Emblems, anything works for him; I mostly keep him with Bandit for more AGI, or Chemist for more balanced stats across the board.

Until you learn all his skills, his best accessory is the aforementioned Can Machine. Once you can all enemies, you can swap to something that fits the playstyle you’re aiming for him. I personally have him with the Swift Sandals (75% of chance to act first) so he can drop Spinach Power as soon as possible.

General Tips

Setups are everything

Combat in this game, especially in the late-game, is all about setups. Your characters will unlock plenty of buffs and debuffs and it is key to lay those down to empower your team while simultaneously cripple the enemy.

For instance, Sienna alone has four really important buffs she should have active nearly all the time, while Glenn should always make sure the enemy has Break debuffs on, With certain setups you can see some really big numbers (I’ve been able to crit +18k with Lenne during the final boss) so it’s important to have your team cover everything.

Don’t bother with Crystals (until later)

The Crystal system at the blacksmith anvil is a potentially powerful, yet a bit obnoxious system (because of RNG and how the combining functions), way to make your characters REALLY powerful, allowing you stack passives to reinforce their strengths or to circumvent a weakness. For instance, stacking Crit Damage Up crystals on Sienna can make her dish out some really insane damage, while adding debuff crystals (i.e. Poison, Blind) on characters with multi-hit moves can make inflicting those easier.

However, I strongly recommend waiting to tamper with this system until the endgame. It’s not really worth hunting down crystals or farming, and the game is already relatively easy enough that you can clear the vast majority of the content without worrying about crystals.

If you want more details on the Crystal crafting, check Xenocite’s excellent Crystal Guide.

Agility is everything

Agility (AGI) is the single most important attribute in the game, hence why Sienna is so busted since she has the highest in the game. Improving your AGI in any way (passive skills, buffs, crystals) is key to get as many turns as possible before the enemy.

Drunken Master (a skill from the Monk Class Emblem) is an ability you should have learned with one or more characters and equipped at all times, and use it as soon the fight starts. It’s party-wide.

Additionally, crippling your enemy’s AGI with Robb’s Leg Shot (and also Kylian’s Leg Aim) is key in any boss fight to further enable more turns for you and less for the enemy.