I'm on Day 200 on my Hard play through... am I screwed?

[Phoxly]

This is my first play through, and so far things have been going pretty well... until I started attempting the true endings (exterminate, unite, etc).

Even with a full party of level 100's with Prayer Manual + epic/legendary weapons and armor I can't exterminate any sects, and the "Challenge" for the Peak Debate I just get 1 shot.

Feels like I've hit a wall, that I can only attribute to the game enemies scaling with the days/time.

I really wanted to get the conqueror trait on my first playthrough :/

[HoHoHO]

why not try for the duke endings?

You should be pretty strong if you get every possible trait along the way. Magic Nature achievement trait from the Taoist sect stargazer achievement give +15% speed, every attack always combos, and ignore armor. If you craft the imperial seal artifact (possible to get in every game), then that makes every attack crit, you always parry, +500 attack/defense, and +10% attack/defense. You'll need to max out your tool making skills to craft it though.

[Ailuchrono]

The only tips I can give is to make sure your martial arts scale off of your build. Some external arts scale str/con/mp/etc. I also found that just having tons of damage isn't enough, tankiness is king. If those still fail, then use incense at the altars to get buffs (s/l if needed), and take some medicine that buffs.

[Phoxly]

Originally posted by HoHoHO:

why not try for the duke endings?

You should be pretty strong if you get every possible trait along the way. Magic Nature achievement trait from the Taoist sect stargazer achievement give +15% speed, every attack always combos, and ignore armor. If you craft the imperial seal artifact (possible to get in every game), then that makes every attack crit, you always parry, +500 attack/defense, and +10% attack/defense. You'll need to max out your tool making skills to craft it though.

So oddly enough, I never got the duke endings to trigger. I've married Duke Kang's Daughter, I joined the Ye Battalion, but none of the assault on Chuxiang or war stuff happened. There's no emperor stuff either from what I've read should happen in guides. I think my game's world events are in a weird state since a lot of what was supposed to happen ended up getting skipped (no kidnappings, no buddha temple etc like the guide said).

My Ye Battallion quest stopped after I got the Swallows to join up, after that there's no other quests from them.

[HoHoHO]

sounds like you never rescued the emperor? if no emperor to rescue, did you ever get the invite to buy legendary items from the night auction?

[titanopteryx]

Well there's a limit to how strong the other characters get on hard. The level cap is 100. They can't go above level 100.

Did you grind your base stats up? getting one shotted means your defense stat is too low. Getting your int and con up will both help with that. To get con up you can eat both blue and purple quality food. For int you can use the statue at the entrance of the Confucius sect and you can use incense at prayer shrines.

You need more better quality inners. They make up a lot of your defense. You can get more legendary ones by sect hopping, getting both their manuals and traits.

Speaking of traits, you didn't rescue the emperor yet? Before you do, do the Scholar chain, getting top scores on all 3 exams. Then when you're rescuing the emperor he gives you a powerful trait called Top Achiever once you've beaten the enemies in black armor at the camp. Don't kill them before he's with you though. Then afterwards beat up the remnants of the Yan Army for another trait.

If you can get to 1000 Guan you get a trait that boosts your attack stat depending on how much money you have.

In your passives the mountain and forest sections have spots that give traits that reduce your damage taken. The mountain one reduces it by 1.5% per point in con you have. The forest one reduces it by 40% and transfers that 40% to nearby enemies.

[Phoxly]

Originally posted by HoHoHO:

sounds like you never rescued the emperor? if no emperor to rescue, did you ever get the invite to buy legendary items from the night auction?

I did get the invite, but I ended up missing it because I was in a weird spot w. I currently know nothing of an emperor in my playthrough right now. It's very odd because all of the guides mention a lot of events I should have experienced by Fame 10 + having gone and talked to every npc in the game.

[Phoxly]

Originally posted by titanopteryx:

Well there's a limit to how strong the other characters get on hard. The level cap is 100. They can't go above level 100.

Did you grind your base stats up? getting one shotted means your defense stat is too low. Getting your int and con up will both help with that. To get con up you can eat both blue and purple quality food. For int you can use the statue at the entrance of the Confucius sect and you can use incense at prayer shrines.

You need more better quality inners. They make up a lot of your defense. You can get more legendary ones by sect hopping, getting both their manuals and traits.

Speaking of traits, you didn't rescue the emperor yet? Before you do, do the Scholar chain, getting top scores on all 3 exams. Then when you're rescuing the emperor he gives you a powerful trait called Top Achiever once you've beaten the enemies in black armor at the camp. Don't kill them before he's with you though. Then afterwards beat up the remnants of the Yan Army for another trait.

If you can get to 1000 Guan you get a trait that boosts your attack stat depending on how much money you have.

In your passives the mountain and forest sections have spots that give traits that reduce your damage taken. The mountain one reduces it by 1.5% per point in con you have. The forest one reduces it by 40% and transfers that 40% to nearby enemies.

The Tao sect leader has 20k hp and takes about 70hp per attack from my guys with 4k attack. I won the duels with all of them, but can't win the exterminate/challenge. It's literally 30k damage they deal to me even with 15 con + forest/mountain specs.

[Phoxly]

Sounds like my best bet is to cash in my 130 or so Achievement points from this run and start over.

[mirune]

sry for bad english
i also play on hard and on day 257 and manage to exexterminate all sect

i use Gu Qingcheng she has skill call A dream of Graceful Beauty with has high chance to unconcious enemy with make them lost 1 turn then i stack posion internal injury bleeding to decease action speed + skill that make turn delay to stunlock him

[nhslfomagf]

During my first run, I attempted the Nightmare difficulty since I have more than 360 hours in Splay the Spire. How bad could this game be compare to that? Well, I was beaten badly. But I managed to get the Peak, Submit and Conqueror endings but that was with the help of my second attempt at Easy. I got the Infinity Internal Manual from the Taoist sect during my second run and I engraved it on a Stone Steele in my homestead. I also learnt the 9 Provinces Internal from the old man sect. I had more than 1 million guan so I gained a trait that boosts 20% more damage based on the amount of money I had. I beat the Yan army with the Infinity Internal + 9 Provinces combo then I crafted the Imperial Seal.
The simple trick is that I pump all of my attributes into Con, then I ate a ton of Lingzhi and some other legendary herbs to increase my HP and MP. I got more than 8300 HP and 6000 MP. I crafted the Imperial Seal <- this is what you seriously need in other to tank those sect leaders' hits.
If you don't want to do the second run. You could still have 1 Int to learn the Infinity Internal Manual but that is very difficult to pull off. Basically you need to gain some red traits to lower you Int to 1.

[Phoxly]

Originally posted by nhslfomagf:

During my first run, I attempted the Nightmare difficulty since I have more than 360 hours in Splay the Spire. How bad could this game be compare to that? Well, I was beaten badly. But I managed to get the Peak, Submit and Conqueror endings but that was with the help of my second attempt at Easy. I got the Infinity Internal Manual from the Taoist sect during my second run and I engraved it on a Stone Steele in my homestead. I also learnt the 9 Provinces Internal from the old man sect. I had more than 1 million guan so I gained a trait that boosts 20% more damage based on the amount of money I had. I beat the Yan army with the Infinity Internal + 9 Provinces combo then I crafted the Imperial Seal.
The simple trick is that I pump all of my attributes into Con, then I ate a ton of Lingzhi and some other legendary herbs to increase my HP and MP. I got more than 8300 HP and 6000 MP. I crafted the Imperial Seal <- this is what you seriously need in other to tank those sect leaders' hits.
If you don't want to do the second run. You could still have 1 Int to learn the Infinity Internal Manual but that is very difficult to pull off. Basically you need to gain some red traits to lower you Int to 1.

I'll leave the old man sect I guess since I've done everything, then see about farming some other sect unique manuals and traits. Thanks!

[Phoxly]

Originally posted by mirune:

sry for bad english
i also play on hard and on day 257 and manage to exexterminate all sect

i use Gu Qingcheng she has skill call A dream of Graceful Beauty with has high chance to unconcious enemy with make them lost 1 turn then i stack posion internal injury bleeding to decease action speed + skill that make turn delay to stunlock him

I use this manual as well, but haven't tried to combo it with any poiso or stunlock/turn delay. I'll look into that more. Thanks!

[Elfie]

Originally posted by Phoxly:

This is my first play through, and so far things have been going pretty well... until I started attempting the true endings (exterminate, unite, etc).

Even with a full party of level 100's with Prayer Manual + epic/legendary weapons and armor I can't exterminate any sects, and the "Challenge" for the Peak Debate I just get 1 shot.

Feels like I've hit a wall, that I can only attribute to the game enemies scaling with the days/time.

I really wanted to get the conqueror trait on my first playthrough :/

Aren't there a level limit of 100?

If i understand correctly hard enemies will grow over time but not over the cap. So at endgame its all about how you built your chracters & the team. Enemies will be lvl 100 but not over that level they will not grow stats after reaching cap

[HoHoHO]

on hard and nightmare, bosses get bonus attack and defense per day. It takes about 600 days before all scaling stops

[darkshintos]

They don't get extra Atk/Def per day. They get Levels very couple of days (+1 Level per 50 days on Nightmare for Bosses). Those are what gives them extra atk/def.