Octopath Traveler 2 - Who is the best starting character?

Like its predecessor, Octopath Traveler 2 provides an early choice between its eight main characters. Whoever you pick will be your founding party member, causing you to delve right into their story.

Each character has a different job, as well as their own distinct strengths and weaknesses. Furthermore, their individual stories greatly differ in subject matter and tone. Octopath Traveler 2 is good enough to provide a neat little synopsis of each character’s situation, but it’s still a tough choice to kick off the game.

So who is the best starting character in Octopath Traveler 2? Let’s review the options.

Does the Octopath Traveler 2 starting character make any difference?

Before we consider the best Octopath Traveler 2 starting character, it’s worth discussing the actual difference that this choice makes.

It actually does make a difference in a number of reasonably important ways:

The starting character cannot be switched out of the main party until you have fully completed their story

Some story events during the game’s closing segments differ based on your starting character, including some minor dialogue changes
You have the optional choice of skipping the opening chapter of every other character, meaning your starting character is the only one whose first chapter is mandatory

Therefore, from both a gameplay and a narrative point of view, the Octopath Traveler 2 starting character is a choice that will affect you for some time. Note that the narrative changes are very slight, and don’t significantly alter the events themselves. Rather, your character simply takes the lead in a couple of key scenes.

Who is the best starting character in Octopath Traveler 2?

In our humble opinion, the best starting character in Octopath Traveler 2 is Throné, the thief.

This is for a variety of reasons:

Throné is able to steal items from NPCs during the daytime, which is probably the most useful Path Action of all. Whilst not exactly ethical, you will be able to acquire a lot of different equipment and items free of charge. This will save you lots of money and allow you to snag some great stuff
The natural progression of Throné’s path will likely cause you to meet Temenos and Osvald as your second and third characters. This gives a nicely rounded team of a physical attacker, a healer and an offensive magic user. If you pick up Ochette as a fourth, this is soon a formidable party
Throné also has the Blessing of Darkness talent, which grants your party a series of buffs for night-time battles. If you also get Temenos, he has a talent that debuffs enemies as well, giving a massive advantage during the night (where you also get more EXP and money!)

She also starts very close to the place where the Inventor job is unlocked, which is a really handy secondary job to equip early on
Throné has an excellent story full of twists and turns. It’s one of the darker stories in the game, but definitely one of the best as well

Ultimately, no other character has this number of benefits to get you started during your adventure. You will still, of course, benefit from these by recruiting Throné after using a different starting character, but it’s better to hit the ground running.

Who are the other best starting characters?

If you are not so fussed on the idea of Throné the thief, perhaps due to the darker story tone or the preference of a different job type, luckily there are still plenty of other good options.

Ochette, the Hunter

Ochette is another excellent starting character because of her Hunter’s skill to catch enemies and use them in battle.

This gives her the ability to strike many different weakness types with single powerful moves, or even AOE multi-hit attacks. She can also catch monsters with healing powers, which don’t cost any SP to use during battle. If you catch the right selection of monsters, Ochette can be a true all-rounder capable of handling any situation. Moreover, her own attacks can pack a powerful punch whilst also having a permanent animal companion who can strike an enemy’s weak point at will.

Ochette’s story is another good one, with some strong emotional beats and a dramatic conclusion. You can definitely do a lot worse as a starter, and Ochette can also recruit Osvald and Temenos pretty quickly if you so choose.

Hikari, the Warrior

As the strongest physical attacker in Octopath Traveler 2, Hikari is another good choice. In fact, he’s the only character on the western continent I would recommend as a starting character. His raw strength can soon turn him into a one-man army capable of destroying hordes of enemies single-handedly. His Path Action also allows him to learn a wide array of different skills from NPCs, enabling him to hit weakness types outside of his typical moveset.

The opening of his story is arguably the most dramatic and action-packed, leading into a heroic tale of Hikari’s exploits to reclaim his kingship of the Japan-inspired realm of Ku. His theme music is also superb, but that’s true of almost everything from Yasunori Nishiki’s masterful score.

Osvald, the Scholar

Osvald is the main offensive magic user, and gets his story started in pretty interesting fashion. Like Throné, this is another of the darker tales, with Osvald instigating a prison break after being falsely accused of murdering his family.

With the ability to instantly identify an enemy weakness at the start of a battle, Osvald gains a significant advantage that can be put to good use with his multi-element and AOE magic attacks. The SP cost means Osvald is best when accompanied by others, but he is still a formidable damage-dealer in the early stages of the game.

Ultimately, Osvald’s story is the main draw, but his proximity to other characters also makes him a great choice. Osvald is on the eastern continent, so he can soon recruit Throné and Temenos, providing a lot of Throné’s benefits at an early stage as well as the nice balance of Temenos’s healing.

Who is the worst starting character in Octopath Traveler 2?

There is no wrong character to start with, and we must stress the choice doesn’t matter that much in the grand scheme of things. The likelihood is you would want to keep your starting party member around until the end of their story anyway.

Agnea’s story is probably the most light-hearted, jovial tale of them all, but it can potentially feel a bit superfluous compared to others. She is not a great starting fighter as her dancing skills primarily work as party buffs, which require team-mates. She can also snag items for free off NPCs, but unlike Throné there is no probability involved. You are either a high enough level to claim it or you’re not.

Partitio’s story also has a reasonably upbeat tone (and terrific theme music), but his field skill of purchasing items from NPCs is surely the worst of the lot. Who wants to buy things when you can get them for free with Throné?

In general, with the exception of Hikari I found the eastern characters far better than those from the west, but each to their own. If there’s a particular character or synopsis you like the sound of, you can go for it.

Conclusion

That’s about all you need to know about the best starting character in Octopath Traveler 2. There are a few things to consider, but you should be all ready to set off with your character of choice.

As a recap:

Throné is a great character due to her stealing, and natural likelihood to pick up Temenos, Osvald and the Inventor job early on. Overall, Throné is our top pick
Ochette can be a terrific all-rounder by catching a bunch of monsters, allowing her to hit many weakness types and also exposing them with her animal companion

Hikari provides an action-packed opening as well as pure brute strength that will make him a crucial damage-dealer as the game goes on
Osvald has an interesting story, and some extremely powerful magic attacks – but he’s at his best with a full team in support

Hopefully you can pick the best character to inspire you on your adventure in Solistia. To check out our spoiler-free Octopath Traveler 2 review, click here.