Boasting around 16 characters to recruit during your playthrough, Koei Tecmo’s Fairy Tail definitely has something for long-time anime fans. Now, let’s say you’ve obtained those characters already, don’t forget that you can increase their ranks and complete their specific stories. Along the way — and while you’re doing certain guild requests — you’ll be able to raise character bonds as well. Here’s our mini-guide to help you out.
Note: For more information, check out our Fairy Tail guides and features hub.
Fairy Tail: How to raise character bonds
Character bonds in Fairy Tail are directly tied to how often you’re using characters to team up together. Basically, the more Natsu, Lucy, Erza, and Wendy are partying up together to complete a guild request, the faster you’ll be able to increase their bonds. You’ll see their bond levels in the Team -> Status -> Bond Rank panel (seen below):
Let’s say you’ve actually been using specific characters when questing and it’s possible for their character bonds to increase (ie. looking at the musical notes), what do you do then? Well, just look at your map. There’s a good chance that you’ll see a musical note icon in town.
When you get there, you’ll see one of your companions and possibly a musical note or a portrait of another teammate floating over their head:
This implies that bonds can be increased with that person. Speaking to this companion triggers a short scene followed by both peeps posing.
What exactly do character bonds do?
The gist is that character bonds in Fairy Tail affect your Magic Chains (aka. combo attacks during battles):
- Level 1 – Raises the Magic Chain rate.
- Level 2 – Lowers the MP required for Magic Chains.
- Level 3 – Provides a small chance that prevents a Magic Chain from failing.
Keeping in mind that Magic Chains and character bonds are exclusive to specific pairings, there’s a good chance that you’ll only be able to maximize these combos for a select few characters (likely your main squad). Still, you’ll gain the option to raise character bonds faster (without the need to team up too often). However, this method comes a bit later in Fairy Tail and will also require jewels (gold).
Fairy Tail is available on Steam. For more information, check out our guides and features hub.