Sounds like the age old problem of difficulty levels being nothing more than multiplication equations. Double the stats on a chump and he's still a chump. Double the stats on a guy who can fuck you up, and now he can double fuck you up. Plus it means your opponents are going to get stronger on a quadratic scale, while you're on a linear scale.
You can either constantly feather the difficulty, going back and forth when needed, or just file them under NG+ options, which honestly I kinda feel is the point with the Tales games and the like.
It really depends on how the difficulty levels were done. I don't think any of the 3D combat system Tales games have gotten difficulty levels right since they are for the most part just a global stat multiplier, which means single digit damage in the beginning unless you've carried over weapons or other such crap and horrible trash grinds where slogging through a dungeon or area is more of a TP/item management problem before you died of boredom when you heavily restrict arte usage.
As far as I'm concerned, if I can crank the difficulty on the first playthrough, that difficulty should be playable for the entire game on a first playthrough. Tales of Destiny R (here I go again) did difficulty levels 'right'. HP was massively increased compared to the attack stat, but defence and the other stats remained the same. The big difference was how resistances were handled. Damage multipliers were increased and crit rates were increased against weaknesses, and attacks against resistances were massively reduced in potency and could not crit. Combined with additional attack sequences, if you're just grinding away at a boss without exploiting their weaknesses you were going to get annihilated by the all out attack of the last 20% of a boss's attack sequence. You could play at the Very Hard difficulty without facing damage sponges that take single digit damages out of a 5 digit HP Pool on the first playthrough unless you were using damage types they were resistant against.
If gald acquisition is the same as in Xillia, I can't wait for NG+
"You're 20,000,000 in debt!"
"Here you go."
What'll be funny is if...
The game doesn't recognize you've paid it all off, and you get locked from continuing the game because you can't pay 0 gald when you have to do one of the "pay to open the next town" options.
If gald acquisition is the same as in Xillia, I can't wait for NG+
"You're 20,000,000 in debt!"
"Here you go."
What'll be funny is if...
The game doesn't recognize you've paid it all off, and you get locked from continuing the game because you can't pay 0 gald when you have to do one of the "pay to open the next town" options.
The power of guns isn't in the damage but the fact that you can basically maintain your distance at almost all times, the only problem targets being small ones. The juggle moveset is good, the artes supporting it are fantastic, and it has an amazing knockdown (down+attack) combo as well. Not to mention it's never a bad thing to be able to attack while moving.
I'm trying to get down the timing to quick-switching myself.
It seems to effectively exploit weaknesses you'll do that quite a bit.
That said keeping up with my distance and AC counter does get in the way.
As for the guns themselves. I think they're good as a support weapon and they allow a good amount of safety making them pretty good, not sure about OP though. Though as long as the AI is working with you well enough it is easy to rack up huge combos with them.
Well as they said in one of the early-game tutorials, exploiting weaknesses enough then following up with a normal combo will produce a window in which your opponent can't counter-attack you at all, leaving a big potential stunlock combo. This is demonstrated by a circle around the target's center that gets smaller and smaller as the combo goes on.
Weapon switching mid-combo is definitely a viable option, and not bad to use when opponents are blocking or you want to improve a juggle combo.
As for combos, most of my combos for Dual Swords revolve around Time Disintegration and Falling Thunder. Time Disintegration after any combo, or at the start of one, will push back your opponent a bit and knock them down. This will generally give you enough time to follow up with Falling Thunder, which not only Crits because they're knocked down, but you get a bonus AC point you can use in the combo because of it.
Gun combos I generally start with Zero Divide or a Bubble Blast followed by normal hits. Usually I don't worry about big combos with the guns since the normals are nice enough that you can just use them for TP gaining. The juggle and Up+X are especially nice. OP was quite an overstatement, sure, but the normal attacks for them are probably the best out of Ludger's weapons by far.
As for the hammer I haven't really gotten enough artes yet to do any promising combos, but Crushing Blow is a nice start on an enemy who isn't focused on you (or is just slow), and Hammer Toss is pretty damn good.
Not that it would have hurt them to let you pay all the lump sum at once, other than making many of the cut-scenes where your debt is brought up less sense. Rideux is also a mega-douche.
So my 10 year old has quite the astute moral sentiments. We got to chapter 7 today, and
became an agent, and learned of our new mission: wipe out the fractured dimensions. Not 30 seconds after the game tells us this, she turns to me and says "But isn't that wrong to do? Won't you be killing an entire world full of people?" I'm so proud. Also, man does Ludger have a ridiculous number of abilities for a single character. Between having 3 weapon sets full of artes and now the Chromatus mode stuff too, it's almost too much.
The only thing Ludger CAN'T do is cast magic. Ranged options? Check. Healing ability? Check. Heavy attack/armor breaking options? Check. Fast DPS and good juggle options? Check. Godlike powers? Check. On top of that, he has up to 32 artes he can have equipped at once (8 per weapon, excluding shortcuts). It's absolutely silly.
Of course, to get the full-power of Ludger out, you have to play him yourself. AI Ludger is kind of... meh.
Ludger was designed/envisioned to be 'you', hence the whole silent protagonist thing for the first playthrough and why he's disgustingly overpowered/versatile.
So my 10 year old has quite the astute moral sentiments. We got to chapter 7 today, and
became an agent, and learned of our new mission: wipe out the fractured dimensions. Not 30 seconds after the game tells us this, she turns to me and says "But isn't that wrong to do? Won't you be killing an entire world full of people?" I'm so proud. Also, man does Ludger have a ridiculous number of abilities for a single character. Between having 3 weapon sets full of artes and now the Chromatus mode stuff too, it's almost too much.
This is actually something I have to get used to.
Keeping track of what abilities I have set to what style is going to be a pain. Right now I only have like 4-6 per style so it isn't too much but man can I see it being a pain later.
That being said, Ludgers stat is all over the place (still hilariously overpowered though). He has more hp than Jude, the same TP, and his other stats are even across the board, even INT which he isnt really using due to the whole physical fighter thing. I guess to fit in with the whole player proxy thing hes got going on.
Ludger was designed/envisioned to be 'you', hence the whole silent protagonist thing for the first playthrough and why he's disgustingly overpowered/versatile.
And honestly, I'm surprised by how good of a job they've done with it. Xillia 2 is far from a perfect game, and there's reasons that I'm sure anyone who played the first one and remembers it clearly would probably agree with, which is re-using stuff from the previous game SHAMELESSLY. Like from area re-hashing to boss designs, this game is practically an expansion more than anything... is what I would say, but they did work a bit more than that, while the re-used stuff does make me swallow my pride.
However in regards to player choices? Fan-fucking-tastic. Hell, there's an example not even half-way through the game where you basically change the boss-fight entirely depending on your choice (as in, an entirely different boss). Like it isn't anything Bioware/Witcher levels of choice importance, but it's a definite step in the right direction. Few JRPGs left the actual direction of the story/narrative, so any inclusion of that in a new title is fine by me.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited August 2014
Yeah. I only played Xillia a few months back so its still fresh in my mind and a lot of stuff is reused.
That said it didn't really surprise me since that tends to be the norm when jRPGs get direct sequels.
Who's feet to I need to lick to get lemon/pineapple gels in the shops?
Elite Monster who can do shit-tons of damage and use a large-scale confusion attack on my whole party? And it's only worth 40k for killing? Yeah, no, fuck you. Gonna save this one for later when I can just stomp it.
I played a bit of it so far. A few thoughts.
1) The cat is adorable.
2) It's still obvious this game was made on a budget. At least what I've seen so far is mostly new. The voicework is thankfully still good.
3) The sort-of silent protagonist thing going on with Ludger isn't great, but it's not as bad as I expected.
4) This game is weird.
5) This game is actually pretty funny. The localization team must've had a fun time with this. Even the trophies have silly descriptions.
Yeah. I only played Xillia a few months back so its still fresh in my mind and a lot of stuff is reused.
That said it didn't really surprise me since that tends to be the norm when jRPGs get direct sequels.
Yeah, it didn't really bother me in FFXIII-2 and -3, or back on PS2 with all the SMT titles using the same assets. It's never made any damn sense to me to make all this stuff for a single game and then throw it away.
Oh god, the party reactions to Muzet in skits are hilarious.
Elle: "She's just like Milla's big sister!"
Milla: "She's not like her at all. My sister had an awe-inspiring presence"
Muzet: "My, aren't you rude! I'll have you know I used to be quite awe-inspiring."
Elize: "I don't know if that's the word I would use..."
Teepo: "She used to be a psychopath!"
Finally got to see not one but two of Ludger's mystic artes. One of which involves him utilizing all 3 weapons in a crazy assault-type barrage.
I like the game because i liked Xillia 1, however does it strike anyone else as ironic that we are playing a game that so heavily duplicated SO MANY of its assets from xillia 1, and its storyline revolves around going to similar dimensions (games) with just small changes?
I like the game because i liked Xillia 1, however does it strike anyone else as ironic that we are playing a game that so heavily duplicated SO MANY of its assets from xillia 1, and its storyline revolves around going to similar dimensions (games) with just small changes?
its just so meta.
Yes, in fact we mentioned this a few posts up :P
I'm about level 50 now, or am level 50, and finished up Chapter 10. Game's a lot easier now that I have gels that are worth their weight now, and I'm not forced to leave Elize out of the party as much. (let's face it, she's a necessary evil)
And the story, both main story and character stories are starting to get more interesting as well. Also having less trouble with bosses on Moderate since getting mystic artes.
Man why wouldn't you want to take Elize? She's awesome!
Then again, I'm not really sure why I have party members other than Ludger, Alvin, Elize, and Leia so...
She's too awesome is the point. She feels like such a crutch but then they make the game so much harder without her around. It's sad. But I'm usually running a party of
Ludger, Jude, Elize, and Muzet. Sometimes switching Jude out with Gaius or Alvin. Muzet's insane (though not literally this time); she basically gets most of the same spells that Milla and Rowen get, and then a few good ones of her own, like Gravity Well. And on top of it all, her support role is INSANE when it comes to battle-field control, as being able to practically warp to your enemy in an instant, or super-dash away from them is incredibly good, especially when baiting Elite Bosses so you can super-stun/exploit them.
Gaius is basically the opposite of Alvin, but has the same role as a heavy-hitting tank. As opposed to focusing on guard breaking and ranged fighting with charge-ups, he focuses on speed and defense instead. Most of his moves have slow start-ups, but are quite literally the powered up boss-versions of moves he had in Xillia one, such as his more powerful Demon Fang, Tiger Blade, and Sonic Thrust moves. And as opposed to Alvin's support role of breaking enemy guards, Gaius focuses on protecting you from heavy damage, which I found humorous when I realized this.
I should use Milla and Rowen more though, as they have their uses. Rowen retains his Tidal Wave which is glorious in its own right, plus a player-controlled Rowen is exceptionally good, and Milla can shift between front-liner and caster when she feels like, so both have their uses. Leia though.... sigh. Leia's good when you're all about nabbing items and such, and her lottery skill comes in handy (that is assuming you didn't level her affinity quickly enough to put it on Ludger instead), but her healing prowess is kind of a joke. Single Target healing is just ineffective and inefficient, especially against bosses and especially later in the game. Buffs are nice though, and she does have some front-line prowess. But yeah, I generally just alter her allium orb extractors occasionally so she learns new stuff, and use her only when the game forces me too, for the most part.
So, how much missable content does this game have? Are the character stories all locked to specific time intervals, or can I catch up later if I miss one? And I assume the red jobthings are the ones that eventually lead to events, while the rest that constantly respawn are just chaff.
I'm not talking awesome in combat. I'm talking awesome as a character. Who chooses their party based on combat abilities that's silly.
However, Elize is also awesome in combat. Heals for everyone, dark magic, and the unstoppable Teepo Roar.
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
edited August 2014
Really. There are so many healing spells to go around I've only really missed Elize in one fight where she would have been really useful.
So much burning...so much.
But I'm only playing on moderate...on hard I'm guessing that would be another story. Though I do agree that I find Leia less useful in this installment, but I also like Rowen a lot more.
I'm not talking awesome in combat. I'm talking awesome as a character. Who chooses their party based on combat abilities that's silly.
I try to go with well-rounded parties that can still mesh well together, and I need a healer. I agree that Elize is a great character, especially having Teepo around (and their interactions with Elle).
On a totally unrelated note:
Smug Ludger, is best Ludger.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
also...seriously thinking about just having my playstation's internal clock set to Sunday all day right now.
Posts
It really depends on how the difficulty levels were done. I don't think any of the 3D combat system Tales games have gotten difficulty levels right since they are for the most part just a global stat multiplier, which means single digit damage in the beginning unless you've carried over weapons or other such crap and horrible trash grinds where slogging through a dungeon or area is more of a TP/item management problem before you died of boredom when you heavily restrict arte usage.
As far as I'm concerned, if I can crank the difficulty on the first playthrough, that difficulty should be playable for the entire game on a first playthrough. Tales of Destiny R (here I go again) did difficulty levels 'right'. HP was massively increased compared to the attack stat, but defence and the other stats remained the same. The big difference was how resistances were handled. Damage multipliers were increased and crit rates were increased against weaknesses, and attacks against resistances were massively reduced in potency and could not crit. Combined with additional attack sequences, if you're just grinding away at a boss without exploiting their weaknesses you were going to get annihilated by the all out attack of the last 20% of a boss's attack sequence. You could play at the Very Hard difficulty without facing damage sponges that take single digit damages out of a 5 digit HP Pool on the first playthrough unless you were using damage types they were resistant against.
"Here you go."
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
What'll be funny is if...
What'll be funny is if...
PSN: BrightWing13 FFX|V:ARR Bright Asuna
Where did you get those? Do special items like that show up in the area completion list or are they 'secret'.
They were in Helioborg. They're on the list.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Well as they said in one of the early-game tutorials, exploiting weaknesses enough then following up with a normal combo will produce a window in which your opponent can't counter-attack you at all, leaving a big potential stunlock combo. This is demonstrated by a circle around the target's center that gets smaller and smaller as the combo goes on.
Weapon switching mid-combo is definitely a viable option, and not bad to use when opponents are blocking or you want to improve a juggle combo.
As for combos, most of my combos for Dual Swords revolve around Time Disintegration and Falling Thunder. Time Disintegration after any combo, or at the start of one, will push back your opponent a bit and knock them down. This will generally give you enough time to follow up with Falling Thunder, which not only Crits because they're knocked down, but you get a bonus AC point you can use in the combo because of it.
Gun combos I generally start with Zero Divide or a Bubble Blast followed by normal hits. Usually I don't worry about big combos with the guns since the normals are nice enough that you can just use them for TP gaining. The juggle and Up+X are especially nice. OP was quite an overstatement, sure, but the normal attacks for them are probably the best out of Ludger's weapons by far.
As for the hammer I haven't really gotten enough artes yet to do any promising combos, but Crushing Blow is a nice start on an enemy who isn't focused on you (or is just slow), and Hammer Toss is pretty damn good.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
They thought of that, unfortunately. There's only an option for 2X gald on replays.
NNID: Glenn565
Well damn.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
PSN: BrightWing13 FFX|V:ARR Bright Asuna
Of course, to get the full-power of Ludger out, you have to play him yourself. AI Ludger is kind of... meh.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
This is actually something I have to get used to.
Keeping track of what abilities I have set to what style is going to be a pain. Right now I only have like 4-6 per style so it isn't too much but man can I see it being a pain later.
PSN: BrightWing13 FFX|V:ARR Bright Asuna
And honestly, I'm surprised by how good of a job they've done with it. Xillia 2 is far from a perfect game, and there's reasons that I'm sure anyone who played the first one and remembers it clearly would probably agree with, which is re-using stuff from the previous game SHAMELESSLY. Like from area re-hashing to boss designs, this game is practically an expansion more than anything... is what I would say, but they did work a bit more than that, while the re-used stuff does make me swallow my pride.
However in regards to player choices? Fan-fucking-tastic. Hell, there's an example not even half-way through the game where you basically change the boss-fight entirely depending on your choice (as in, an entirely different boss). Like it isn't anything Bioware/Witcher levels of choice importance, but it's a definite step in the right direction. Few JRPGs left the actual direction of the story/narrative, so any inclusion of that in a new title is fine by me.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
That said it didn't really surprise me since that tends to be the norm when jRPGs get direct sequels.
Elite Monster who can do shit-tons of damage and use a large-scale confusion attack on my whole party? And it's only worth 40k for killing? Yeah, no, fuck you. Gonna save this one for later when I can just stomp it.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
1) The cat is adorable.
2) It's still obvious this game was made on a budget. At least what I've seen so far is mostly new. The voicework is thankfully still good.
3) The sort-of silent protagonist thing going on with Ludger isn't great, but it's not as bad as I expected.
4) This game is weird.
5) This game is actually pretty funny. The localization team must've had a fun time with this. Even the trophies have silly descriptions.
Yeah, it didn't really bother me in FFXIII-2 and -3, or back on PS2 with all the SMT titles using the same assets. It's never made any damn sense to me to make all this stuff for a single game and then throw it away.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Yeah. I'm also surprised with Elle.
Kid characters in games tend to be a crapshoot as far as how much I like them goes but she's been pretty entertaining so far.
Milla: "She's not like her at all. My sister had an awe-inspiring presence"
Muzet: "My, aren't you rude! I'll have you know I used to be quite awe-inspiring."
Elize: "I don't know if that's the word I would use..."
Teepo: "She used to be a psychopath!"
Finally got to see not one but two of Ludger's mystic artes. One of which involves him utilizing all 3 weapons in a crazy assault-type barrage.
EDIT: OMG LEMON GELS! YES! Daddy missed you ;_;
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
its just so meta.
Yes, in fact we mentioned this a few posts up :P
I'm about level 50 now, or am level 50, and finished up Chapter 10. Game's a lot easier now that I have gels that are worth their weight now, and I'm not forced to leave Elize out of the party as much. (let's face it, she's a necessary evil)
And the story, both main story and character stories are starting to get more interesting as well. Also having less trouble with bosses on Moderate since getting mystic artes.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
Then again, I'm not really sure why I have party members other than Ludger, Alvin, Elize, and Leia so...
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
She's too awesome is the point. She feels like such a crutch but then they make the game so much harder without her around. It's sad. But I'm usually running a party of
Gaius is basically the opposite of Alvin, but has the same role as a heavy-hitting tank. As opposed to focusing on guard breaking and ranged fighting with charge-ups, he focuses on speed and defense instead. Most of his moves have slow start-ups, but are quite literally the powered up boss-versions of moves he had in Xillia one, such as his more powerful Demon Fang, Tiger Blade, and Sonic Thrust moves. And as opposed to Alvin's support role of breaking enemy guards, Gaius focuses on protecting you from heavy damage, which I found humorous when I realized this.
I should use Milla and Rowen more though, as they have their uses. Rowen retains his Tidal Wave which is glorious in its own right, plus a player-controlled Rowen is exceptionally good, and Milla can shift between front-liner and caster when she feels like, so both have their uses. Leia though.... sigh. Leia's good when you're all about nabbing items and such, and her lottery skill comes in handy (that is assuming you didn't level her affinity quickly enough to put it on Ludger instead), but her healing prowess is kind of a joke. Single Target healing is just ineffective and inefficient, especially against bosses and especially later in the game. Buffs are nice though, and she does have some front-line prowess. But yeah, I generally just alter her allium orb extractors occasionally so she learns new stuff, and use her only when the game forces me too, for the most part.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
However, Elize is also awesome in combat. Heals for everyone, dark magic, and the unstoppable Teepo Roar.
So much burning...so much.
But I'm only playing on moderate...on hard I'm guessing that would be another story. Though I do agree that I find Leia less useful in this installment, but I also like Rowen a lot more.
I try to go with well-rounded parties that can still mesh well together, and I need a healer. I agree that Elize is a great character, especially having Teepo around (and their interactions with Elle).
On a totally unrelated note:
Smug Ludger, is best Ludger.
XBL: GamingFreak5514
PSN: GamingFreak1234