Hard to keep the game difficult

[mylomane]

Until the Item World opened, I felt this game was pretty challenging. It was hard to get money too. Once entering into the item world, I started leveling up crazy fast, and having more HL than needed. Now, going through the story, it's a cake walk. Am I playing this game wrong?

I know you can raise difficulty is cheat shop, but that seems silly as the same issue will eventually happen. IDK, still really like the game, but looking for some tips to keep it fun.

[mimizukari]

You basically play the game how you want. Even though I used item world a few times throughout story progression it never got to the point i overleveled story and had too much HL until path to carnage and onwards. Difficulty stars are exactly for that, and that's why there's 20 of them. you won't run into the same issue unless you're overusing item world, the stars will also level the item world and make it more difficult as well.

[Raven]

I feel like the disgaea should be used for a social experiment for impulse control...seriously, just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean you HAVE to. Your experience is what you want to make of it. The game can be a power fantasy on steroids if you want where your slightest breath clears the battle field, or you can keep it challenging where you're scrapping by and overcoming great ordeals, and anything in between.

Edit: Heck, just as a reminder: the cheat shop works both ways. Yeah, it can make things easy and make your grind super fast, but you can also ramp up the difficulty to insane levels if you really need a challenge.

[Rangoric]

Go to the cheat shop and increase the stars until it's about how hard you want it. I did a bit of item world so now when doing story things I'm at 7 stars and that makes it decent. Going off in the item world so that even 20 stars is hard will take some serious doing, so it should work out.

Just turn it all the way down if you do item world so you don't level too fast, then back up for story. That's been my pattern.

[mylomane]

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll try messing with the difficulty stars a bit to get it just right. I've played every Disgaea, only beat 3 and 5, never got too much into the post game, but would like to with this one. Is there anything that makes post game very difficult?

[mimizukari]

Originally posted by mylomane:

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll try messing with the difficulty stars a bit to get it just right. I've played every Disgaea, only beat 3 and 5, never got too much into the post game, but would like to with this one. Is there anything that makes post game very difficult?

extremely difficult if you don't use exploits like 3x3 grids of buff spam to level your char. just getting into carnage is harder than any previous Disgaea game when playing "the intended way", the stat requirement is insane and requires you to use your knowledge of all prev games, i didn't even need to reincarnate to get into carnage in disgaea 5 but with 7 you may need to do so multiple times + level item stats up/etc. then the "Carnage stage" parts themselves are even more difficult than the entry.


Also don't forget you can reduce your EXP gain and increase other stuff if you're leveling too fast for your liking.

[Raven]

Originally posted by mimizukari:

Originally posted by mylomane:

Thanks for the tips guys. I'll try messing with the difficulty stars a bit to get it just right. I've played every Disgaea, only beat 3 and 5, never got too much into the post game, but would like to with this one. Is there anything that makes post game very difficult?

extremely difficult if you don't use exploits like 3x3 grids of buff spam to level your char. just getting into carnage is harder than any previous Disgaea game when playing "the intended way", the stat requirement is insane and requires you to use your knowledge of all prev games, i didn't even need to reincarnate to get into carnage in disgaea 5 but with 7 you may need to do so multiple times + level item stats up/etc. then the "Carnage stage" parts themselves are even more difficult than the entry.


Also don't forget you can reduce your EXP gain and increase other stuff if you're leveling too fast for your liking.

Is that true? I'm not unlocking carnage yet, but I remember D2 being super annoying with the treasure maps. Thanks to some horrendous RNG I spent like 30 hours alone just trying to get all the maps :S

[mimizukari]

Originally posted by Raven:

Originally posted by mimizukari:

extremely difficult if you don't use exploits like 3x3 grids of buff spam to level your char. just getting into carnage is harder than any previous Disgaea game when playing "the intended way", the stat requirement is insane and requires you to use your knowledge of all prev games, i didn't even need to reincarnate to get into carnage in disgaea 5 but with 7 you may need to do so multiple times + level item stats up/etc. then the "Carnage stage" parts themselves are even more difficult than the entry.


Also don't forget you can reduce your EXP gain and increase other stuff if you're leveling too fast for your liking.

Is that true? I'm not unlocking carnage yet, but I remember D2 being super annoying with the treasure maps. Thanks to some horrendous RNG I spent like 30 hours alone just trying to get all the maps :S

only RNG involved in unlocking the precursor quest itself is gachapon, keep up with that and finish overlord tier.

the problem comes with the actual postlude quest itself, it's incredibly difficult with way higher stats than anything you ever faced before, even if you were playing on 20 difficulty stars up to that point. it's basically already a 21st difficulty star right off the bat

[raelynne63]

Originally posted by mylomane:

Until the Item World opened, I felt this game was pretty challenging. It was hard to get money too. Once entering into the item world, I started leveling up crazy fast, and having more HL than needed. Now, going through the story, it's a cake walk. Am I playing this game wrong?

I know you can raise difficulty is cheat shop, but that seems silly as the same issue will eventually happen. IDK, still really like the game, but looking for some tips to keep it fun.

Disgaea games have always been easy going through story mode, that has never been difficult in any Disgaea game. The challenges have always been the extras in post game.

[mimizukari]

Originally posted by raelynne63:

Originally posted by mylomane:

Until the Item World opened, I felt this game was pretty challenging. It was hard to get money too. Once entering into the item world, I started leveling up crazy fast, and having more HL than needed. Now, going through the story, it's a cake walk. Am I playing this game wrong?

I know you can raise difficulty is cheat shop, but that seems silly as the same issue will eventually happen. IDK, still really like the game, but looking for some tips to keep it fun.

Disgaea games have always been easy going through story mode, that has never been difficult in any Disgaea game. The challenges have always been the extras in post game.

IMO 6 & 7 did a great job with their story difficulty, they were both sufficiently difficult compared to what came before. But the reality is that it's as difficult or easy as you want, you get full control over how difficult the game is. someone even tried a single prinny to beat the story and there was one quest that took them immeasurably numerous attempts because it's meant to do be done with a party, same with a certain boss.

If you're not using DLC charas and not overleveling than 7's story is brutal in the early game though does get easier-ish later on

[raelynne63]

I'm not sure how a single character run can work when you have to throw yourself over to areas to move forward. Even a mecha girl cant reach everything on a couple floors. Fodder level 1 characters for that purpose maybe. I like watching the story, but I usually whip through it after I've played around in the Martial dimension and item world. I won the story but haven't done my normal playing in the item world. It has always been my favorite part of every disgaea where I would lose myself for thousands of hours. At this point, I'm not really happy with what they've done to it. I'm going to try to play around in it and see if I can like it a little.

[mimizukari]

Originally posted by raelynne63:

I'm not sure how a single character run can work when you have to throw yourself over to areas to move forward. Even a mecha girl cant reach everything on a couple floors. Fodder level 1 characters for that purpose maybe. I like watching the story, but I usually whip through it after I've played around in the Martial dimension and item world. I won the story but haven't done my normal playing in the item world. It has always been my favorite part of every disgaea where I would lose myself for thousands of hours. At this point, I'm not really happy with what they've done to it. I'm going to try to play around in it and see if I can like it a little.

The gameplay loop of reach end then reincarnate item is more interesting than any other implementation of item world we've had so far imo. Also, Etna would be able to reach every floor if you gave her a vernier thruster or two and her unique evility that lets her fly over panels, i can pretty much reach across the entire map with her in my playthrough in any given map

[CleverLikeMe]

Really hard to talk about difficulty in these games bro. The nature of Disgaea means that almost any enemy can be basically impossible to kill, or can die instantly from any attack, depending on the stats of that enemy (via difficulty stars / mode / etc) relative to the stats of whatever character is being used.

I'm not really to the post game yet because I've been chilling (no idea if my play time is visible but if it is... I leave my PC on a lot accidentally with games open).

Not going to tell anyone how to play the game or what they can or should enjoy, but generally speaking Disgaea games aren't enjoyed for the tactical difficulty of their battles or fights, though that doesn't mean there arent various challenges to be had in that arena. Mostly, Disgaea games are enjoyed for the grind (as far as gameplay goes, ignoring the aesthetic or the people who like the stories). Layered progression systems and a variety of 'mechanics' that kind of feel like 'exploits' are where the fun usually is. Granted, I personally had the strongest sense of 'getting one over on the game' or whatever back in the first one, because it was the first game of this type that I played and because I really felt like I was breaking something when I exploited mechanics to power level or whatever. These days, all of that stuff is expected - I walk in to a Disgaea title expecting to be able to break the game in a variety of ways and hoping they surprise me a bit along the way.

Anyway, I wouldn't claim postgame is difficult either. Postgame is fun because you can mess with the game enough to make uber characters, then realize even those 'uber' characters are pretty weak until you build crazy items to go with them. The fun for me is always getting the snowball effect started. I always really enjoy getting over the initial hump where it's hard to make things go fast. Whether I go far beyond that point depends...

[Soft Head]

Originally posted by mylomane:

Until the Item World opened, I felt this game was pretty challenging. It was hard to get money too. Once entering into the item world, I started leveling up crazy fast, and having more HL than needed. Now, going through the story, it's a cake walk. Am I playing this game wrong?

I know you can raise difficulty is cheat shop, but that seems silly as the same issue will eventually happen. IDK, still really like the game, but looking for some tips to keep it fun.

use dark assemble to rasie bad guys

[AtebitBacon]

I had the same issue. The Story felt meh because i was allowed to use item world too fast and i had unlocked the cheat shop very early on as well. Any interesting choices or themes they crafted for the maps in the story were made trivial and in my opinion, this game as a whole only caters to new players. honestly I think after the 7th, version only your loyal fans are really looking to play another iteration of the game so why not incorporate a few little nods to the veterans?
The Item world should have been gated till after you beat The Red Hair Boobed Lady and the cheat shop definitely shouldn't be available as a passable bill til you are like 5 chapters away from the end of the main story. Because Item world can accelerate level progress so fast there should be a few quests that slow down the Item worlds availability as well. Something like gating certain features of item world behind completed chapters of the game. Example- you cant go to floor 20 of a rare item until beating X chapter, or something crazy like enemy stats scale to the number of improved items in your inventory and there could have been a story based reason behind that, which would be removed after you complete said story quest. I'm actually surprised they never added an enemy scaling mechanic to the game, its a quick somewhat lazy but effective way to keep the game challenging.
I Personally think (although i have not looked into it) that a lot of the older designers and developers that worked on the previous games either left for were chased away some how, because while this game was passable and I somewhat enjoyed it (because im a fan), there are minute decisions that jump out at me as "falling at the seams" type mechanics and design choices.
Jumbility was not a good mechanic to add imo but if they went balls to the walls with it then it would have actually been an awesome mechanic. For me, rather than making the game more challenging and enjoyable through that challenge, the jumbility mechanic made ALL ENEMIES ANNOYING AF especially when they were about to die. And thing is, even Giant enemies were made insignificant after reincarnating one time and leveling up to like 200 with something like "Intense mean guy" as an evility.

[Toddasaurus Rex]

I'm the opposite, disgaea has always been about rushing to get the generics unlocked so I can make my ideal party and ditch the main characters, for me anyways, I spent alot of time plugging away at the second to last tournament stage grinding. Dropping money/mana gain and doubling XP while pumping up the levels pretty far to just chew through the game so I can get the generics unlocked.

I will admit for disgaea the game was pretty hard early on till I realized that stage would make a good grind and got the cheatshop unlocked, I got the gacha unlocked too around that time and if anything the gacha is totally broken. It completely trivialized any money issues I had and I'm able to run better shops bill every chapter so far and keeping my party topped off with the best gear I can buy. I've got everyone around level 75 with a million HL in chapter 11.

Loved the story too so far, Disgaea 2 was my favorite because Adell is the MAN, but after the events of chapters 9 and 10 im really falling for its charm. My only gripes are that item world jumps in enemy level too suddenly by floor, and removal of the floor depth is kind of lame. I also feel like the monster list is pretty lacking in this one and only 4 weapon specific skills is kind of lame too but otherwise I'm having a total blast and the game hasn't even really started for me yet.