Quests

Side stories in Octopath Traveler 2 are almost never gated by level. They are gated by who is standing next to you. A quest asks for a piece of information, an item in a stranger's pocket or a person willing to follow you across the map, and the only key that fits is a particular traveller's path action. Arriving at the right town with the wrong four in the party is the most common way to bounce off a side story.

So this page sorts the six side stories on our wiki by how many of your four party slots they claim, and by whether the game gives you a choice about which traveller fills them. Every one of them can be walked away from and picked up later, but knowing the cost in slots before you set out saves a return trip.

The six side stories at a glance

One slot, no substitutes

Three side stories will not budge on who does the work, and two of them want the same person.

Lighthouse Restoration is Partitio's, specifically his wallet. The keeper at Canalbrine needs an Aelmorite Reflector, the spare is held by the keeper on Lighthouse Island out in the Sundering Sea, and buying it costs 1,500 leaves. Our guide is unusually direct about the alternative: Throne's Steal does not work here, the attempt fails, and you lose reputation in the town for trying. You also need a ship before you start, which quietly makes this a sequel to the next entry.

Scent of Commerce is three quests wearing one name, all of them Partitio's and all available once his first chapter is done. In Sai you Hire Masoud's daughter for 1,000 leaves, discover she is not the treasure he meant, and then Hire Masoud himself for 5,000 to hear that his greatest treasure was himself. In Winterbloom you gather three musicians for Audley, the inventor of a voice recorder: the Guitarist at the Crackridge entrance, the Violinist in the Canalbrine tavern and the Pianist in the Flamechurch chapel. In Tropu'hopu you find two NPCs with the Coy Wink and Lucky Break abilities and bring them to Terry at the harbour.

The rewards are the reason it is the most consequential side story in the game: a Gramophone for the taverns, the Mercantile Manuscript, and the option to buy the Ship for 100,000 leaves. Everything on this page that mentions sailing is downstream of that purchase, as is the Arcanist job. Temenos's daytime Guide works better than Partitio's Hire for gathering the musicians, which is the one place a second traveller earns a slot.

A Young Girl's Wish belongs to Osvald, twice over. The girl at the cemetery outside Conning Creek will not even name her three wishes until he Scrutinizes her, and the cleric novelist she is looking for is not where the quest marker suggests. She is in Bolderfall, in the small church in the northern part of town, and Scrutinize is what gets the sequel out of her. The other two wishes are more forgiving: a crepe from the maker outside the castle gates in New Delsta, bought with Partitio, mugged with Osvald or stolen with Throne, and Roland the floral designer from Timberain's town square, recruited with Partitio for 19,200 leaves or guided across by a sufficiently high-level Temenos.

One slot, your pick of four

The Late Riser is the friendliest quest on this page because it accepts four different solutions to the same problem: knock a fisherman out so he wakes up at night and goes fishing.

He fights with a skill called Bottoms Up that confuses whoever it lands on, and he has very little health, so a couple of punches settle it either way. Beyond the leaves and the Slippery Nut, the Master Fisherman teaches you Bottoms Up as thanks, which is the only skill on this page you get from a side story rather than a job.

Four slots, all named

Wanted: A Good Joke asks for the full set of information-gathering actions in one party, which is unusual enough to be worth planning around. Joe, Partitio's friend, is trying to impress a girl and has no material, so you collect three jokes from Harry, Nikki and Ned around Oresrush.

The recommended four are Osvald for Scrutinize, Hikari for Bribe, Temenos for Coerce and Castti for Inquire, because the three NPCs move around between day and night and you want every option available when you find them. In practice Harry, a miner outside the Foundry, gives up his Self-Deprecating Joke to Hikari's Bribe, while Nikki up the stairs and Ned in the tavern both answer to Castti's Inquire. The quest wants you at around level 6 and unlocks after Partitio's first chapter.

Those same four actions are what the game leans on whenever an NPC knows something you need, so this is a party worth keeping together for a stretch rather than assembling for one quest.

The whole roster

The Netherworld is not really a side story. It is three side stories chained together, with a level requirement that applies to your entire travelling squad rather than to the four you take out, and Galdera waiting at the end.

It opens with Traveler's Bag, which begins by itself after chapter one when Al asks you to chase down the thief who took his belongings. The location differs depending on which traveller you started with, but the scene is always the same: a campfire, a carriage and a few barrels. Then comes Procuring Peculiar Tomes, started at the Montwise Library in the Crestlands by talking to the Unusual Tome Specialist, which wants everyone in your squad at level 35 or above.

The third quest, Far Reaches of Hell, sends you back to Al in the library and then out on the ship to Beasting Bay Anchorage and north to the Nameless Isle, where a Gigantes is guarding the high ground. Beating it draws out George, and getting the deciphering method out of him takes one of the same four actions as the joke hunt: Osvald's Scrutinize, Hikari's Bribe, Temenos's Coerce or Castti's Inquire. Al vanishes once you report back, and the gate itself is on the island marked only with question marks out in the Sundering Sea.

The party that unlocks the most

Read down the table and one line-up covers almost everything here. Partitio opens two quests outright and buys his way through a third. Osvald is the only key to A Young Girl's Wish and one of the four interrogators everywhere else. Throne handles the theft and the one ambush that the Netherworld chain genuinely requires. That leaves one flexible slot, and Temenos or Castti fills it depending on whether you would rather guide people across the map or ask them questions.

For everything downstream of the ship, our weapons guide covers the treasure the sea opens up, and the bosses guide covers the optional fights waiting at the end of a voyage. Party pairings for all eight travellers are in our best party guide.