Seriously, I hate myself for ever finishing that fight. It would still be an incredibly challenging fight if he only broke out the Gaia's Rage when you tried to null things. The fact that it's just a normal move and that you need to rely on dormina to survive it pushes it over the threshold into cheap.
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YggiDeeThe World Ends With You ShillRegistered Userregular
edited October 2009
Is there a specific line between scrotum-crushingly challenging and masochistic bullshit in regards to SMT bonus bosses? At what point are you allowed to punch an Atlus employee?
Is there a specific line between scrotum-crushingly challenging and masochistic bullshit in regards to SMT bonus bosses? At what point are you allowed to punch an Atlus employee?
At the point where you see an Atlus employees and he or she are within arm's reach.
Bosses with changing affinities by turn are my limit personally. Once I have to start calculating HP to avoid a Diarahan is when I'm ready to one-inch punch an Atlus employee.
When you go ahead and get ready to take him on, I'm sure that you'll be reading gamefaqs and some forum posts on how to go about doing it. Most of the advice is sound, but my advice is never underestimate the power of Debilitate. Most every post talks about using it in the Red Star strategy but not in the normal-beat-him-straight-up strategy. Use Debilitate (only with Cielo of course, Serph/Argilla (or Gale) should be attacking) whenever you can, that little bit of dropped power/accuracy/defense/etc can make the difference. And even though it may get hit with a dekunda before you can do anything, that's a turn wasted that is NOT a mamudo.
You KNOW it's a fight when every little luck of the diceroll you can push in your direction matters.
My general strategy for all optional bosses thus far has been Debilitate x3 on first turn, then mind/power charge and last word/executioner/ragnarok, depending on what the boss is weak or strong to. Even if they Dekunda, I take the same stance as you: it's another turn they can't use Celestial Ray/Death Flies/pull Serph's pants down and bend him over. When they begin to Dekunda every turn, I'll do a power/mind charge with either Serph or Heat, debilitate with the other, then Last Word or Executioner. I have enough MP, Salvation on both Serph and Argilla and a revival orb, so healing isn't an issue. I know Hito is a completely different league, but I'll try this strategy out and if I fail, I'll try something else. The Fly Beelzebub fight had a luck component to it too, as he completely destroyed me until I managed that lucky critical, so I'm no stranger to luck shenanigans. I consider myself an SMT vet at this point.
I want to do this as clean as possible, so I won't be looking at any FAQs for strategies. Advice is certainly appreciated though.
The problem you're going to run into is status effects and instant death screwing you over. You aren't immune to anything anymore so javelin rain can just wreck you. Expect to hold on to Power Charges and Mind Charges for a lot of rounds because you can't stop using salvation, dekunda, and MP restoring items.
Also Debilitate will never last more than one round. Even with the pixie strategy one round is all it's going to last. Make it count and decide if the HP loss from Ragnarok is worth it.
Yeah, I remember reading somewhere a while ago that if you come into the fight with null anything (other than Null Sleep I think?) he just spams Gaea Rage until everyone dies (I may be mixing that up with P3's uber boss). I think that's sweet. While it's always frustrating to get nailed with a lucky Mudo, how else can an RPG boss be challenging? Simply jacking up HP to a ridiculously high number only makes a fight an endurance match (how long can you continue with one strategy until he dies or you die) and a matter of grinding until your party's stats are maxed out. That's not challenge, that's tedium.
The random or even "cheap" element adds a dynamic to every fight that's been pretty central to all SMT games I've played. This is why I play these games, because of their ability to smack me in the face and send me packing even when I think I have all my bases covered. A battle is only exciting to me if almost every turn I have to make the decision of whether I should heal, or chip off a slight bit of damage.
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My general strategy for all optional bosses thus far has been Debilitate x3 on first turn...
Hito gets first turn. If you're lucky, you might be able to do something on your first turn that isn't healing or resurrecting, and honestly, you're only going to have room for debiliate on one char (I put mine on Cielo Mist).
Also, you CAN bring death resist. Which is highly recommended. Recarmda on Cielo isn't a terrible idea either, since he may be the only one alive after a dormina/rage combo
Also Debilitate will never last more than one round. Even with the pixie strategy one round is all it's going to last. Make it count and decide if the HP loss from Ragnarok is worth it.
Totally agreed. If you DO go pixie strategy, you MUST keep a beneficial spell up on your own party because They will Dekaja first, THEN Dekunda (it's been a while since I beat it either way...I think I'm remembering this right). So it's possible to keep debilitate up, but you're going to be spending a lot of time making sure they don't bring it down.
So I'm nearly done with The Answer (I think). I'm really playing just to finish it now, but it's not terrible. Anyway, all this talk about really tough bosses made me realize why the SMT games are looking to be my new favorite RPGs. I've only played P3 so far, but I like that in boss fights, you really need to take plan ahead, which usually means going into the fight blind once and getting you're ass kicked. Then there is the added strategy/luck involved in telling the other members of my party what to do (and hoping they don't act stupid). It basically makes every fight frustrating, but so satisfying after winning. Can't wait to get into the other SMT games out there now.
tldr: Persona requires actual strategy when playing, and makes an SMT convert out of me.
tldr: Persona requires actual strategy when playing, and makes an SMT convert out of me.
One of us...one of us...
You're in luck. You have many hours of gameplay ahead in P4, Digital Devil Saga1/2, and Nocturne (Nocturne being the most difficult by far)
And really, give us your honest opinion: Aigis isn't as bad as everyone here keeps claiming, is she.
Nocturne isn't that hard guys once you figure out how to cheese your stats.
That's what I'm liking about what I'm hearing about SJ so far, you can't pick your stats so hopefully it will cut down on that sort of cheesing.
You can, however, fuse anywhere...
It's not that big of a deal if you're talking about the ability to get new demons with full HP/MP. You could just buy (usually relatively cheap) demons from the compendium to do that, or recruit new demons. And if you're just entering an area, there's a good shot that you'll be leveling up and recovering that way well before you ever actually run out of MP. And it's generally really easy to find a healing node or just leave and come back, anyway. Short-term resource management never seems to be that important.
Otherwise, fusion anywhere is a great call. The sheer amount of stuff that happens when you level up demons gives you a huge incentive to switch up the party a lot, even beyond the normal matching of weaknesses or just regular tailoring of the party you'd normally expect. And demon recruitment is quick and plentiful enough that you'll have plenty of fodder if you focus on it.
There are "incenses" lying around the world that will up any stat by one, and can be used on your main character. The Labyrinth of Amala has a ton of them (there's one area where you can get like five or six Magic Incenses). You can also easily get them if you know which of the boxes they can sometimes be in when you trade your lucky tickets (gotten from buying stuff at the shop) for items along with a small amount of save scumming. It is advisable to ONLY use them on your main character.
This is because later in the game it becomes much easier to summon Mitama (more cash and gems, mostly), which can be fused to any of your demons for a fairly large stat boost.
tldr: Persona requires actual strategy when playing, and makes an SMT convert out of me.
One of us...one of us...
You're in luck. You have many hours of gameplay ahead in P4, Digital Devil Saga1/2, and Nocturne (Nocturne being the most difficult by far)
And really, give us your honest opinion: Aigis isn't as bad as everyone here keeps claiming, is she.
Yeah, I truthfully don't mind Aigis that much. She kind of grew on me I guess, but I can also see where the hate comes from. I don't want to start another Aigis hate war though because it will last for 10 more pages.
Out of interest: I'm just playing through Persona 3 FES. If I'd chosen something other than Kendo and Painting as after-school activities, would I have met different characters to form Social Links with?
Thirith on
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
You can do Kendo, Track, or Swimming and Music/Band, Art, or Photography.
But does it matter for Social Links, like is Kazuki on any of the teams or do you always end up joining the Kendo team to get the Strength/Chariot/Star social links unlocked?
You can do Kendo, Track, or Swimming and Music/Band, Art, or Photography.
But does it matter for Social Links, like is Kazuki on any of the teams or do you always end up joining the Kendo team to get the Strength/Chariot/Star social links unlocked?
There are "incenses" lying around the world that will up any stat by one, and can be used on your main character. The Labyrinth of Amala has a ton of them (there's one area where you can get like five or six Magic Incenses). You can also easily get them if you know which of the boxes they can sometimes be in when you trade your lucky tickets (gotten from buying stuff at the shop) for items along with a small amount of save scumming. It is advisable to ONLY use them on your main character.
This is because later in the game it becomes much easier to summon Mitama (more cash and gems, mostly), which can be fused to any of your demons for a fairly large stat boost.
technically you might also want to use them on Dante
You can do Kendo, Track, or Swimming and Music/Band, Art, or Photography.
But does it matter for Social Links, like is Kazuki on any of the teams or do you always end up joining the Kendo team to get the Strength/Chariot/Star social links unlocked?
Aigis honestly had a lot of charming beauty in the same blunt way that Anya from Buffy had, expecially when learning about "humanness", illustrated in several points, and oddly enough in death too, and oh god I didn't just make a Aigis to Buffy the vampire slayer comparison did I...
You're not terribly far off, really, although there are, of course, a few differences.
Anya was a fun, funny character that was handled horribly largely through the writers having no idea where to take her story while Aigis was a dull, boring character that was handled horribly largely through the writers shifting much too much of the focus onto her.
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3DS: 1607-3034-6970
At the point where you see an Atlus employees and he or she are within arm's reach.
You KNOW it's a fight when every little luck of the diceroll you can push in your direction matters.
I want to do this as clean as possible, so I won't be looking at any FAQs for strategies. Advice is certainly appreciated though.
Also Debilitate will never last more than one round. Even with the pixie strategy one round is all it's going to last. Make it count and decide if the HP loss from Ragnarok is worth it.
The random or even "cheap" element adds a dynamic to every fight that's been pretty central to all SMT games I've played. This is why I play these games, because of their ability to smack me in the face and send me packing even when I think I have all my bases covered. A battle is only exciting to me if almost every turn I have to make the decision of whether I should heal, or chip off a slight bit of damage.
Don't max luck.
Bring lube.
If you ever need to talk to someone, feel free to message me. Yes, that includes you.
Hito gets first turn. If you're lucky, you might be able to do something on your first turn that isn't healing or resurrecting, and honestly, you're only going to have room for debiliate on one char (I put mine on Cielo Mist).
Also, you CAN bring death resist. Which is highly recommended. Recarmda on Cielo isn't a terrible idea either, since he may be the only one alive after a dormina/rage combo
Totally agreed. If you DO go pixie strategy, you MUST keep a beneficial spell up on your own party because They will Dekaja first, THEN Dekunda (it's been a while since I beat it either way...I think I'm remembering this right). So it's possible to keep debilitate up, but you're going to be spending a lot of time making sure they don't bring it down.
tldr: Persona requires actual strategy when playing, and makes an SMT convert out of me.
You're in luck. You have many hours of gameplay ahead in P4, Digital Devil Saga1/2, and Nocturne (Nocturne being the most difficult by far)
And really, give us your honest opinion: Aigis isn't as bad as everyone here keeps claiming, is she.
That's what I'm liking about what I'm hearing about SJ so far, you can't pick your stats so hopefully it will cut down on that sort of cheesing.
You can, however, fuse anywhere...
It's not that big of a deal if you're talking about the ability to get new demons with full HP/MP. You could just buy (usually relatively cheap) demons from the compendium to do that, or recruit new demons. And if you're just entering an area, there's a good shot that you'll be leveling up and recovering that way well before you ever actually run out of MP. And it's generally really easy to find a healing node or just leave and come back, anyway. Short-term resource management never seems to be that important.
Otherwise, fusion anywhere is a great call. The sheer amount of stuff that happens when you level up demons gives you a huge incentive to switch up the party a lot, even beyond the normal matching of weaknesses or just regular tailoring of the party you'd normally expect. And demon recruitment is quick and plentiful enough that you'll have plenty of fodder if you focus on it.
There are "incenses" lying around the world that will up any stat by one, and can be used on your main character. The Labyrinth of Amala has a ton of them (there's one area where you can get like five or six Magic Incenses). You can also easily get them if you know which of the boxes they can sometimes be in when you trade your lucky tickets (gotten from buying stuff at the shop) for items along with a small amount of save scumming. It is advisable to ONLY use them on your main character.
This is because later in the game it becomes much easier to summon Mitama (more cash and gems, mostly), which can be fused to any of your demons for a fairly large stat boost.
Yeah, I truthfully don't mind Aigis that much. She kind of grew on me I guess, but I can also see where the hate comes from. I don't want to start another Aigis hate war though because it will last for 10 more pages.
It would only last for five pages before someone said "at least she isn't Ken/Naoto" and then that war would go on for another five pages.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
It does make a difference in P4, though.
I've never really tried.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
But does it matter for Social Links, like is Kazuki on any of the teams or do you always end up joining the Kendo team to get the Strength/Chariot/Star social links unlocked?
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
"Nothing is gonna save us forever but a lot of things can save us today." - Night in the Woods
technically you might also want to use them on Dante
*snrk* oh man I can't say it with a straight face
Until you pick a team and the waveform collapses.
I'm still waiting for news on P5... guess I'll have to kill time by finally getting around and beating Person on the PSP...
Anya was a fun, funny character that was handled horribly largely through the writers having no idea where to take her story while Aigis was a dull, boring character that was handled horribly largely through the writers shifting much too much of the focus onto her.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970
Hopefully there will still be ways to do 4000+ damage to bosses like in nocturne.
That was always fun.
3DS: 1607-3034-6970