WHy is chapter 11 so difficult?

[sick duck]

I don't like having to grind, and the 5 hours I've spent on that is too much as it is. I've refunded the sequels, but it is too late to give this one back obviously.

[Minneyar]

You don't have to grind. It's possible to skip almost every non-boss encounter in the game and still beat it. Heck, there was a speedrun at AGDQ a few days ago that beat the entire game in under 5 hours.

If there are specific things you're having problems with, you can ask for advice and people will probably help you out.

[Pure Mind Games]

Are you talking about the C'ith Stones? because those are optional and a lot are meant for later.

[sick duck]

I just decided I'd rather watch the last 2 hours as a game-movie on youtube. I'm sure I'm not missing anything and the last time the game mixed thing up was when it gave me full roster and paradigm control and I liked that part for a while. I expect not much else between that and the end credits except for grinding up bigger numbers.

[tiornys]

FFXIII is a game that expects you to learn how to use all of the different offensive and defensive resources available, and by chapter 11 that's a lot of potential resources. If you feel like you have to grind, you're overlooking some (or most) of those resources. It's not about grinding up bigger numbers--it's about stacking compounding damage multipliers to blow up the numbers.

[Mako]

Originally posted by Pure Mind Games:

Are you talking about the C'ith Stones? because those are optional and a lot are meant for later.

Actually early stones is what you are supposed to be doing right away. They unlock fast travel. They often have weaker marks than regular monsters around that big area. And those stones destinations guide you to areas with weaker monsters. If you follow those early (20 or so) stones in order you will have much easier time in chapter 11.

[Zach]

Final Fantasy games have always required grinding. I remember grinding like crazy in FF10 for Celestial weapons and getting every Aeon. I had to grind to level 99 in FF15 to fight most bosses and do Steyliff Grove.

Point is these games require effort otherwise you won't really beat it.

[Pure Mind Games]

Originally posted by Mako:

Originally posted by Pure Mind Games:

Are you talking about the C'ith Stones? because those are optional and a lot are meant for later.

Actually early stones is what you are supposed to be doing right away. They unlock fast travel. They often have weaker marks than regular monsters around that big area. And those stones destinations guide you to areas with weaker monsters. If you follow those early (20 or so) stones in order you will have much easier time in chapter 11.

They're still optional and at some point you're going to hit one that is meant for later.

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Final Fantasy games have always required grinding.

This is factually wrong. FFVII can be done with No Encounters turned on levelling up only through Bosses EXP and AP, FFVIII is easier if you avoid levelling.

[Melodia]

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Final Fantasy games have always required grinding.

None have ever /required/ grinding.

[Mako]

Originally posted by Pure Mind Games:

Originally posted by Mako:

Actually early stones is what you are supposed to be doing right away. They unlock fast travel. They often have weaker marks than regular monsters around that big area. And those stones destinations guide you to areas with weaker monsters. If you follow those early (20 or so) stones in order you will have much easier time in chapter 11.

They're still optional and at some point you're going to hit one that is meant for later.

Sure but if you do early stones in order you will be guided to Padra ruins first, then back to steppes to unlock chocobos and then to main quest route through mines. You'll only see harder stuff meant for later chapters if you backtrack from mines-tower-oerba track on your own. But if you just follow early stones you'll visit every major location in chapter 11 (except for Titans warrens) once, get smoother progression, some easy CP and unlock fast travel and chocobos. There is no reason not do do this unless you're speedrunning. Most early stones can be easily 5-starred 1st try without any grinding before doing them.
Also there are at least 2 story-related cutscenes in Padra and nearby massif that you'll miss if you just go directly to mines.

[Zach]

Originally posted by Melodia:

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Final Fantasy games have always required grinding.

None have ever /required/ grinding.

Ok so go beat ff10 without touching your sphere grid and make sure to get all aeons and celestial weapons. Make sure you beat ff13 without touching the crystarium or upgrading any gear. You have to grind you can't just beat the game without literally putting any effort into it.

Originally posted by Pure Mind Games:

Originally posted by Mako:

Actually early stones is what you are supposed to be doing right away. They unlock fast travel. They often have weaker marks than regular monsters around that big area. And those stones destinations guide you to areas with weaker monsters. If you follow those early (20 or so) stones in order you will have much easier time in chapter 11.

They're still optional and at some point you're going to hit one that is meant for later.

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Final Fantasy games have always required grinding.

This is factually wrong. FFVII can be done with No Encounters turned on levelling up only through Bosses EXP and AP, FFVIII is easier if you avoid levelling.

Sorry never played 8 but if you have to play off no encounters then fine. It just makes beating the game a little longer. And it's not wrong in any context sorry.

[Minneyar]

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Ok so go beat ff10 without touching your sphere grid

There's literally a FAQ on how to do this: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps2/197344-final-fantasy-x/faqs/16203

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Make sure you beat ff13 without touching the crystarium

Again: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/ps3/928790-final-fantasy-xiii/faqs/59596

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

or upgrading any gear.

I don't know of a guide for this, but no sane person would consider it "grinding" to simply use items that the game gives you.

For reference, most people use the term "grinding" to refer to fighting any battles or collecting resources that you are not literally required to do by the game. Just because you can't imagine beating a game without grinding doesn't mean that it's not possible.

[Zach]

FFX guide you posted looks like it relies on Aeons heavily. In short this requires you to grind for them and to level them.

FF13 guide requires use of shrouds in turn requires farming or grinding for them.

"I don't know of a guide for this, but no sane person would consider it "grinding" to simply use items that the game gives you.

For reference, most people use the term "grinding" to refer to fighting any battles or collecting resources that you are not literally required to do by the game. Just because you can't imagine beating a game without grinding doesn't mean that it's not possible."

Grinding is a broad term. Simply farming xp to get a smaller amount of HP or a new ability node is grinding. Getting mats to level your weapon is grinding. See the point?

Also I can't imagine it simply because I don't wanna burden myself with artifical difficulty. Why would you wanna do a no ability run? Putting limits like that on yourself is pointless and imo only for the masochist. But hey if you wanna do stuff like that knock yourself out. Maybe you'll tell the OP to delete his save and go for the no Crystarium run instead.

[tiornys]

The true no-grind run for FFXIII is called Mandatory Fights Only and it is more than doable. You do use the Crystarium and upgrading, but only with the CP gained from mandatory fights and gil/components from treasures that don't require extra fights to access and the drops from the required fights. edit to add: the FFXIII any% speedrun is very close to a highly optimized MFO run; it should be obvious that you could readily cut out the few extra fights taken (because it's faster than avoiding them) and still complete the game if you weren't worried about realtime speed:

https://youtu.be/qS62Ep11ebI

Similarly, FFX is easily defeatable in "no-grind" fashion using rewards on path and well under the "expected" number of random encounters. Similarly, every FF since at least FFVI is easily defeatable using rewards on path and well under the expected number of encounters. I suspect you can go further and defeat most/all of these games with mandatory encounters only, but I'm not familiar enough with the challenge play communities of each game to be sure.

I don't agree that fighting battles not required by the game is grinding, and I don't think most people use that definition. I believe that most people would agree with the definition found in Wikipedia: "In video games, grinding is the act of performing repetitive tasks to achieve a desired outcome." Going out of your way to repeat encounters and/or get extra encounters is grinding. Fighting all of the enemies on encountered on path is not grinding. And by that definition, no FF requires grinding to complete storyline play, not even the significantly more difficult NES-era FF games.

[Minneyar]

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

Grinding is a broad term. Simply farming xp to get a smaller amount of HP or a new ability node is grinding. Getting mats to level your weapon is grinding. See the point?

No. My point is that you don't need to do any of those things. I don't know why this is so hard to get across.

I'm honestly not sure what your point is. The OP was complaining that he doesn't like grinding. People are telling him he doesn't need to grind. This is an objectively true statement for any reasonable definition of "grinding." It is easy to beat the game by only fighting encounters and gathering items directly in your path; nobody considers that to be "grinding," and you've now been given multiple examples of how it is possible to beat many FF games by doing even less than the expected amount and intentionally avoiding encounters or items. Your statement of "Final Fantasy games have always required grinding" is both provably wrong and has also added nothing useful to this topic.

[sick duck]

Originally posted by DontMakeMeJumpmaster:

FFX guide you posted looks like it relies on Aeons heavily. In short this requires you to grind for them and to level them.

FF13 guide requires use of shrouds in turn requires farming or grinding for them.

"I don't know of a guide for this, but no sane person would consider it "grinding" to simply use items that the game gives you.

For reference, most people use the term "grinding" to refer to fighting any battles or collecting resources that you are not literally required to do by the game. Just because you can't imagine beating a game without grinding doesn't mean that it's not possible."

Grinding is a broad term. Simply farming xp to get a smaller amount of HP or a new ability node is grinding. Getting mats to level your weapon is grinding. See the point?

Also I can't imagine it simply because I don't wanna burden myself with artifical difficulty. Why would you wanna do a no ability run? Putting limits like that on yourself is pointless and imo only for the masochist. But hey if you wanna do stuff like that knock yourself out. Maybe you'll tell the OP to delete his save and go for the no Crystarium run instead.

Do you know what a normal person even is?