Things I wish I knew at the Start

[Inquisition]

1. Difficulty - Doesn't matter, it only effects item drops but later on in the game you get a bonus meter for multiple combat counters in a small time. Which you can max out whenever you want with a very cheap consumable.
I played it on hard start to finish and discovered that this had no effect on EXP, SP or any other gains other then me just beating a sponge until I got to the rest of the story.
Just put it on normal and play the game, have fun.

2. Dodge Rolling - Its actually Counter Attack, it doesn't do a good job for evasion its better to use it as a counter attack and just jump into attacks instead of away 90% of the time. I discovered this well after the first boss and it made the game so much more fun.

3. Don't button mash - Your next ability or attack combo is que'd after a single press, so you're actually better off watching the enemy to see if its worth cancelling your next input for a counter or just switching to a new character and fiddling around there and playing the system more like FF7re.

4. The Party System - Its similar to FF7re's battle system which is awesome, play the other characters and get good with them too, it doesn't take alot and it makes everything way more fun. It also speeds combat up tremendously since it'll fill the BP Gauge at a much faster rate, everyone has a burst ability that does insane amounts of damage and makes the game way more interesting.

5. Don't grind just get through the story knock out the side quests, I regret wasting time grinding thinking I might be under leveled for something. Turns out the game does a really good job with the CP system to show if you need a few extra levels to progress or some kind of advancement in gear or armor. Moving through the story actually opens up more of the game and gives you critical things that make the things you're trying to accomplish from grinding more accessible.

6. The AI Dies Too much - This actually meant I was undergeared, or wasn't playing well not that the AI was bad.

7. Accessories - They don't mean much, and if you plan on using them mitigation is better then outright damage most of the time until end game.

8. Alphen - His BG ability is 90% of your parties damage, and his charge attack is 50% of your parties damage, especially at end game when it can literally knock out half of a bosses HP or instant wipe those mobs you've been struggling with.

[Tyrant]

1. Difficulty dictates your exp/sp multiplier, which makes an even bigger difference when you unlock those battle chains for stringing multiple battles together.

2. Dodging isn't countering. You can execute a counter strike using your Normal Attack after you've achieved a perfect dodge/block. I've dodged hundreds of times and only used Counter Edge maybe a handful of times, just isn't worth it.

3.You can adjust the input delay for queuing actions, you really shouldn't mash tho, you're right on that. Mostly due to the fact that you can't dodge cancel martial/hidden artes, so you could lock yourself into an animation that gets you hurt/killed.

5. Yes you should target side quests as soon as they become available and complete them as close to the relevant level as possible. When it comes to side quests that ask you to take down Zeugles, save before you enter the fight because there's a decent possibility it's significantly higher level than you, including some that take you to new areas.

6. AI is fine. If yours is dying too much it's likely your fault for kiting things into them or dodging through them. You can also change the parameters and conditions they use to dictate their actions. The default is sufficient for beating Hard with little difficulty though.

7. Accessories are far from not meaning much. You're able to effectively reduce enemy damage output by 50% on multiple boss fights just by making sure you have the right accessories equipped. You also get access to several really good offensive accessories before the end game as well.

8. This is absolutely not the case unless you're tremendously overleveled. His ability causes a knockdown on any enemy that isn't in Overlimit status, but does not do an incredible amount of damage on its own. His Blazing Sword abilities are also not particularly great, and can also leave you vulnerable. His mystic arte is also pretty underwhelming unless you go through the trouble of triggering Blazing Pillar.

[Raivik]

I only have to reply on your final point. Alphen is literally the entire team. By end-game I could do well over 189k damage with a single Blazing Sword skill which you unlock by the second lord. Nobody else in the party gets close to that. It gets to the point where you just use boost to knock people down so you can use your health to kill enemies. Using the later blazing sword skill I could do over 200k, mystic arts do barely 40k.

[Nphyx]

If you main Alphen maybe his blazing sword is great, but if you let AI run him and enable blazing sword artes he just kills himself constantly and burns CP like it's going out of style. With them off, his DPS is weaker than anybody but Doh and Kisara. Just keep that in mind if you're wanting to play other characters.

[Scyris]

Originally posted by Inquisition:

1. Difficulty - Doesn't matter, it only effects item drops but later on in the game you get a bonus meter for multiple combat counters in a small time. Which you can max out whenever you want with a very cheap consumable.
I played it on hard start to finish and discovered that this had no effect on EXP, SP or any other gains other then me just beating a sponge until I got to the rest of the story.
Just put it on normal and play the game, have fun.

2. Dodge Rolling - Its actually Counter Attack, it doesn't do a good job for evasion its better to use it as a counter attack and just jump into attacks instead of away 90% of the time. I discovered this well after the first boss and it made the game so much more fun.

3. Don't button mash - Your next ability or attack combo is que'd after a single press, so you're actually better off watching the enemy to see if its worth cancelling your next input for a counter or just switching to a new character and fiddling around there and playing the system more like FF7re.

4. The Party System - Its similar to FF7re's battle system which is awesome, play the other characters and get good with them too, it doesn't take alot and it makes everything way more fun. It also speeds combat up tremendously since it'll fill the BP Gauge at a much faster rate, everyone has a burst ability that does insane amounts of damage and makes the game way more interesting.

5. Don't grind just get through the story knock out the side quests, I regret wasting time grinding thinking I might be under leveled for something. Turns out the game does a really good job with the CP system to show if you need a few extra levels to progress or some kind of advancement in gear or armor. Moving through the story actually opens up more of the game and gives you critical things that make the things you're trying to accomplish from grinding more accessible.

6. The AI Dies Too much - This actually meant I was undergeared, or wasn't playing well not that the AI was bad.

7. Accessories - They don't mean much, and if you plan on using them mitigation is better then outright damage most of the time until end game.

8. Alphen - His BG ability is 90% of your parties damage, and his charge attack is 50% of your parties damage, especially at end game when it can literally knock out half of a bosses HP or instant wipe those mobs you've been struggling with.

As for 1, I went thru the game and am now in the last area on hard. Debating on changing to normal just because of how damn tanky everything is. They only hit 10-15% harder on hard than normalk on average, sometimes less even. But the 30% or so extra hp they get really draws out the fights. I also think they get higher penetration/resistance on hard, as its much harder to interupt them, and they seem to interupt you very easly. Hell at the point of the game I am at the battle time diff between normal and hard is about 20 seconds faster on normal. Like these lv 50 wolves have 20810 hp on normal, but 26000 on hard. The enemy book shows the enemies stats as if it was normal difficulty no matter what the actual difficulty you have it on is. Been debating on lowering it down to normal as I am just tired of how long it takes to kill things. I mean normal encounters don't really ever kill me as it is, and hard seems to do nothing but make them take longer. Only benefit to hard is the 50% more score from fights so its much MUCH easier to get high bonuses in the chain battle gauge on hard. I'm just being stuborne and don't wanna lower it when I been on hard since I first started the game.

As for 6, naw gear has nothing to do with it mostly. The AI is just bad period, The worse enemy type for the AI seems to be anything with a charge, as they often always eat the charge.

The problem with 8 is the cure points system. Your going to drain youself fast lowering him to 1 hp each battle to use the blazing sword charged attacks. But I could imagine the insane damage it can get to if you were to stack fire damage +15% 5 times on a accessory for a 75% bonus to it. I still feel the best Blazing sword attack is still the very first one you get.. Ranged, large cone aoe.

[Scyris]

Originally posted by Nphyx:

If you main Alphen maybe his blazing sword is great, but if you let AI run him and enable blazing sword artes he just kills himself constantly and burns CP like it's going out of style. With them off, his DPS is weaker than anybody but Doh and Kisara. Just keep that in mind if you're wanting to play other characters.

yeah Alphen kinda relys on the blazing sword for dps, if you don't use the attacks with it, hes actually rather subpar. As you said never let the AI use them, they will get themselves killed constantly as it spams them.

[BlackRose <3]

The AI is absolutely terrible, gets hit by everything and consumes CP just by dying and getting hit over and over.

I am very tired of it.

[Yukikaze]

Originally posted by Raivik:

I only have to reply on your final point. Alphen is literally the entire team. By end-game I could do well over 189k damage with a single Blazing Sword skill which you unlock by the second lord. Nobody else in the party gets close to that. It gets to the point where you just use boost to knock people down so you can use your health to kill enemies. Using the later blazing sword skill I could do over 200k, mystic arts do barely 40k.

Strong imply that you cant do like half that with a charged astral arte without killing yourself and while being able to use multiple in one combo... And no item or CP use afterwards... Also using boost attack to knock down enemies to use your health to kill enemies was... THE entire point of his character? Lol

[Scyris]

Originally posted by BlackRose <3:

The AI is absolutely terrible, gets hit by everything and consumes CP just by dying and getting hit over and over.

I am very tired of it.

Even normal difficulty doesn't help much, as enemies only hit 10% harder on hard on average. The main diff is the enemy has 30% higher hp and higher resistance/penetration, so they crit you more and are much harder to interupt and can interupt you super easly.

[Scyris]

Originally posted by Yukikaze:

Originally posted by Raivik:

I only have to reply on your final point. Alphen is literally the entire team. By end-game I could do well over 189k damage with a single Blazing Sword skill which you unlock by the second lord. Nobody else in the party gets close to that. It gets to the point where you just use boost to knock people down so you can use your health to kill enemies. Using the later blazing sword skill I could do over 200k, mystic arts do barely 40k.

Strong imply that you cant do like half that with a charged astral arte without killing yourself and while being able to use multiple in one combo... And no item or CP use afterwards... Also using boost attack to knock down enemies to use your health to kill enemies was... THE entire point of his character? Lol

Yeah, problem is thats all he has. Without the blazing sword attacks hes actually rather subpar to most of the cast. Only one he's better than without blazing sword is Kisara, everyone else can easly out dps him, well maybe Dohalim can't, but Shione, Rinwell and Law deff can.

[Yukikaze]

Also I can count the amount of fights I had to solo on hard without being hideously underleveled on one hand. The AI isn't really as bad as everyone gives it ♥♥♥♥ for. It perfect evades most attacks tbh.

There's obviously things it handles very badly i.e. dot attacks or huge AoE's but with almost all of those being elemental and the game throwing amazing elemental accessories at you early on
... Is it really the AI's fault if your gear sucks ass?

Not to mention anyone who complains about the AI and dies in the fight themselves. At that point, they're just mad the AI isn't carrying them.

[Inquisition]

Originally posted by Tyrant:

1. Difficulty dictates your exp/sp multiplier, which makes an even bigger difference when you unlock those battle chains for stringing multiple battles together.

2. Dodging isn't countering. You can execute a counter strike using your Normal Attack after you've achieved a perfect dodge/block. I've dodged hundreds of times and only used Counter Edge maybe a handful of times, just isn't worth it.

Have you tried dodging into attacks? Its a Perfect Counter 99% of the time if not then your point is moot.

3.You can adjust the input delay for queuing actions, you really shouldn't mash tho, you're right on that. Mostly due to the fact that you can't dodge cancel martial/hidden artes, so you could lock yourself into an animation that gets you hurt/killed.

Who cares? Don't button mash

5. Yes you should target side quests as soon as they become available and complete them as close to the relevant level as possible. When it comes to side quests that ask you to take down Zeugles, save before you enter the fight because there's a decent possibility it's significantly higher level than you, including some that take you to new areas.

Duh?

6. AI is fine. If yours is dying too much it's likely your fault for kiting things into them or dodging through them. You can also change the parameters and conditions they use to dictate their actions. The default is sufficient for beating Hard with little difficulty though.

No duh? It just means they're getting OHKO which is remedied with adding a extra level or two or getting better armor.

7. Accessories are far from not meaning much. You're able to effectively reduce enemy damage output by 50% on multiple boss fights just by making sure you have the right accessories equipped. You also get access to several really good offensive accessories before the end game as well.

I equipped opals one time and never bothered with them again until the very end game. Most of their stat effects aren't that major enough to farm for until the end game as well, and even then the only real MUST have stat is going to be - Cast Time and + BG gauge on Alphen or if you're a sociopath or want to do speed runs +15% Fire dmg.

8. This is absolutely not the case unless you're tremendously overleveled. His ability causes a knockdown on any enemy that isn't in Overlimit status, but does not do an incredible amount of damage on its own. His Blazing Sword abilities are also not particularly great, and can also leave you vulnerable. His mystic arte is also pretty underwhelming unless you go through the trouble of triggering Blazing Pillar.

WhAt If ThEy HaVe SuPeR aRmOR?
That's what you sound like, his abilities literally kill everything in the game and can stun every enemy in the game including bosses which is how you do 90% of your damage.
His BG is the single most important stat on his body and just because you haven't figured out how to use his ability doesn't mean its bad, it literally hits for 500-10k A HIT, and most of them are multi hit before getting anywhere near end game which is far more then what any other character in the game can hope for from a single attack.

Mystic arts are free burst damage, stun and free invulnerability window that pushes the enemy to the other side of the field which is far from underwhelming.

[Id3alistic]

I didn't know how to properly change strategy during a battle until I got to menancia. I kept changing default settings and was wondering why it wasn't working.

[Inquisition]

Originally posted by Id3alistic:

I didn't know how to properly change strategy during a battle until I got to menancia. I kept changing default settings and was wondering why it wasn't working.

I never really bothered with it, plus its buggy? Sometimes if you change strategies mid fight they don't actually take effect.