Weapon Master achievement

[bzcharkl]

Has anyone gotten this legitimately? I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong or it really is the massive grind it seems to be. Steam says I've clocked up 58 hours since Ultimate was released, and I would guess at least 40 of those were in Infinity mode, but I've still only managed to make 24/100. Even if I add up the additional incidental drops I've gotten for other characters, I still doubt I'm more than a third of the way there.

Mostly what I'm doing is grinding Ophiuchus. The game says subsequent clears have increased rewards, and I guess I do see that to a point, but it's still not really as significant as I would like, I have probably gone through the tower dozens of times now and I'm getting about 3-4 unique materials for each active character per clear. At this rate I'm thinking it will take me another 100+ hours to get this single achievement, which is a massive outlier compared to all the others (I had 100% in the base game in about 70 hours all up, and I wasn't even trying to be efficient about that).

So is there a better way of doing this than just Ophiuchus? And if no, do duplicates for the same officers count towards your 100 or do they all have to be unique?

[Dave]

I'm sure some people have gotten it legitimately, but with such small hours, I doubt it.

[C4RNIVOR3]

Originally posted by bzcharkl:

And if no, do duplicates for the same officers count towards your 100 or do they all have to be unique?

Acquired 100 different types of weapons using Craft command.

According to the flavour text on the achievement they need to be unique.

Honestly I think even crafting 50 weapons would have been enough for an achievement, as much of a grind and general timesink it is. The completion rate for the achievement is currently standing at 0.1% and I'm hard pressed to believe whoever has it got it legit. I mean maybe if you've done nothing else with your time this past week since release but grind infinity mode? For 50 weapons that would be believable but not for 100.

[bzcharkl]

So it's up to 0.2% now, which either means more cheaters or I'm definitely doing something wrong, because I've been playing a frankly unhealthy amount since making this post and I'm up to 47/100, but I'm also basically out of gems and crystals which just adds even more grind. There has to be a better way to do this, but I'm not really seeing it.

I admit I'm not being super efficient, I'm taking about 8-10 minutes per stage in Ophiuchus on average, but I can't see much room for improvement otherwise. The only other option I can think of is to use someone whose weapon I've already made on point to blitz through the stages faster just to collect the clear bonus for my assist characters, but I don't know if it would be a net benefit compared to slower clears for 3 characters at once.

[ingosupercute]

If it comforts you I still don't have the materials for even a single officer yet, since I haven't repeated any stages so far. Still climbing up that darn tower.

[bzcharkl]

Well, as for my own progress now, I'm at 74/100, and I have played roughly 110 hours since Ultimate dropped a bit over two weeks ago. I am certainly not being as efficient as possible, but I've made some progress in that regard since my previous post.

For anyone else who is looking at getting this achievement, my most important advice is don't bother, it's painful and not worth it. If you are still determined, a vast majority of your materials will come from your Ophiuchus clear bonuses, rather than any individual stages, and to that end I would recommend focusing your initial efforts on a few characters who will be geared towards specialising in each objective. Get them their weapons first, and fully mod them. Sub those in as your point characters for rushing through floors 1-9, then clear floor 10 with 3 characters you are working to get weapons for. Designate one of these three as your point character, preferably someone you have the unique weapon for and decently modded.

Some suggestions for specialist characters that I have been using:
# of KOs - Gaia is probably the best overall character in the game, and amazingly efficient at mowing down hordes of enemies.

# of KOs, 2x musou bonus - Athena probably just tops Gaia for this, since her musou attack is bigger and 360 degrees.

# of KOs, 2x magic bonus - Character isn't really as important here, but I have found Gleipnir to be good for this as the sacred treasure, since its normal magic attack gathers enemies and still does a good chunk of damage. Another tip is to use someone with deification because they will have infinite magic gauge while deified. I personally went with Yukimura but since you can change the sacred treasure now pretty much any of them should be fine with the right weapon.

Chaos Origin KOs - As above, since they are most vulnerable to magic, someone with Deification is helpful to minimise the amount of time you are waiting for power to recharge. Gleipnir charge magic seems to work well here, there might be better options but I already had Yukimura set up for it.

Smashing pots - I have been using Maeda Keiji since his C5 string will smash a pot in one go. I have noticed that characters with clones/Multi also tend to do better than others, so Nene might be worth considering but I haven't tried, Keiji does well enough.

Destroy anchors - I got basically nothing, this is the worst objective to get by far. You can try using Gungnir for the time stop which will save you the hassle of clearing out the enemies around every anchor, but it won't save you much time in the long run.

Any other objective shouldn't be much of a problem, pretty much any maxed character should be able to handle it.

As far as support members go, the main shortage I have been running into is crystals and gems, so I have usually been running 4x Crystal bonus. Side note is that if you use Zeus, Gaia and Hades as support members for this bonus you'll also start each stage with a Tear of the Gods, which is a decent perk. I haven't bothered looking into formation bonuses beyond this, since a lot of others require bringing in someone with a useless bonus like +exp or +weapons, and I'm not sure the tradeoff would be worth it.

As far as gems go, every once in a while I'll switch to 4x gems support and do a stage with attribute nullification on, usually just a generic # of KOs stage, which will take a while but award a ton of gems and overall it seems more efficient than just spending the same amount of time running stages without attribute nullification.

So that's basically my mini-guide for Weapon Master, if anyone has any other suggestions I'm all ears.

[Death Wish]

Originally posted by bzcharkl:

Well, as for my own progress now, I'm at 74/100, and I have played roughly 110 hours since Ultimate dropped a bit over two weeks ago. I am certainly not being as efficient as possible, but I've made some progress in that regard since my previous post.

For anyone else who is looking at getting this achievement, my most important advice is don't bother, it's painful and not worth it. If you are still determined, a vast majority of your materials will come from your Ophiuchus clear bonuses, rather than any individual stages, and to that end I would recommend focusing your initial efforts on a few characters who will be geared towards specialising in each objective. Get them their weapons first, and fully mod them. Sub those in as your point characters for rushing through floors 1-9, then clear floor 10 with 3 characters you are working to get weapons for. Designate one of these three as your point character, preferably someone you have the unique weapon for and decently modded.

Some suggestions for specialist characters that I have been using:
# of KOs - Gaia is probably the best overall character in the game, and amazingly efficient at mowing down hordes of enemies.

# of KOs, 2x musou bonus - Athena probably just tops Gaia for this, since her musou attack is bigger and 360 degrees.

# of KOs, 2x magic bonus - Character isn't really as important here, but I have found Gleipnir to be good for this as the sacred treasure, since its normal magic attack gathers enemies and still does a good chunk of damage. Another tip is to use someone with deification because they will have infinite magic gauge while deified. I personally went with Yukimura but since you can change the sacred treasure now pretty much any of them should be fine with the right weapon.

Chaos Origin KOs - As above, since they are most vulnerable to magic, someone with Deification is helpful to minimise the amount of time you are waiting for power to recharge. Gleipnir charge magic seems to work well here, there might be better options but I already had Yukimura set up for it.

Smashing pots - I have been using Maeda Keiji since his C5 string will smash a pot in one go. I have noticed that characters with clones/Multi also tend to do better than others, so Nene might be worth considering but I haven't tried, Keiji does well enough.

Destroy anchors - I got basically nothing, this is the worst objective to get by far. You can try using Gungnir for the time stop which will save you the hassle of clearing out the enemies around every anchor, but it won't save you much time in the long run.

Any other objective shouldn't be much of a problem, pretty much any maxed character should be able to handle it.

As far as support members go, the main shortage I have been running into is crystals and gems, so I have usually been running 4x Crystal bonus. Side note is that if you use Zeus, Gaia and Hades as support members for this bonus you'll also start each stage with a Tear of the Gods, which is a decent perk. I haven't bothered looking into formation bonuses beyond this, since a lot of others require bringing in someone with a useless bonus like +exp or +weapons, and I'm not sure the tradeoff would be worth it.

As far as gems go, every once in a while I'll switch to 4x gems support and do a stage with attribute nullification on, usually just a generic # of KOs stage, which will take a while but award a ton of gems and overall it seems more efficient than just spending the same amount of time running stages without attribute nullification.

So that's basically my mini-guide for Weapon Master, if anyone has any other suggestions I'm all ears.

I want to share with some tips too:

Smashing pots stage - Athena is the best choice. Her first charged attack (shield throwing) can "one shot" pot in 1 second. You just have to count your distance so that your shield directly hit pot (with every "spin"). Also with Aegis EX treasure normal magic makes her travel through the map very fast, so you can finish mission in 3 minutes or less.

KO's - Cai Wenji with normal attack-oriented build while mounted probably even better, because there's just small groups of enemies, and she can combine highs speed (on horse) and high damage with pretty good range. There's not that big enemy groups for Gaia's "spin to win"

KO's with 2x Magic Bonus - Zeus with Keranuos EX also great choice. His normal magic attack deals great damage with wide range and also drag enemies to you. With Surge element magic gauge recovering even faster.

KO's with 2x Musou Bonus - i prefer Dong Zhuo as musou-oriented character. His aerial musou attack have a pretty wide range and a way faster than Athena's musou. Not 360 degree, but still. Actually because "Dynasty series" characters have 2 different types of musou attacks they're have some good choices for that challenge, you just have to find someone you like more. Also i found Loki good at this, because he have pretty good basic musou damage and his X-X-X-Y combo imbune weapon and make it absorb enemy's life and musou with high rate even with musou attacks, so you can just spam it.

[bzcharkl]

Originally posted by Death Wish:

Smashing pots stage - Athena is the best choice. Her first charged attack (shield throwing) can "one shot" pot in 1 second. You just have to count your distance so that your shield directly hit pot (with every "spin"). Also with Aegis EX treasure normal magic makes her travel through the map very fast, so you can finish mission in 3 minutes or less.

I haven't tried the other stuff you recommended yet, but I just wanted to say you are absolutely correct here, kinda wish I had known about this sooner.

[Death Wish]

Originally posted by bzcharkl:

I haven't tried the other stuff you recommended yet, but I just wanted to say you are absolutely correct here, kinda wish I had known about this sooner.

Well, the other stuff is kinda personal, and probably not the best choices at all, but still. But you still have some meaning to experiment. And in addition to all - for Officer and Chaos Origins KO's - Nemea's Lion treasure is good choice. With Divinity and Courage elements you can easily slay officer and especially C.O. with 1 charged magic blow. WO character with Surge element even better. No need to worry about Tear of the gods.

[C4RNIVOR3]

god speed to you both, the grind for this achievement has burnt me out already and i've hardly started in comparison. But given that climbing through the towers to even get to ophiuchus yields you next to nothing in terms of materials by the time its all said and done, this achievement is absurdly grindy for... no reason at all. as much as i want to not bother with it, i did have 100% clear for this game prior to ultimate achievements getting tacked out, so i will do it eventually out of sheer spite but god koei really needs to boost the drop rates.

[bzcharkl]

So I finally finished this achievement earlier today, for anyone who wants an estimate I clocked up roughly 150 hours since Ultimate released, and earlier I guessed about 20 of those were on story/other stuff, so an estimate of 130 hours for this single achievement.

Also now I hate myself, and this game, and will have to spend some time thoroughly re-examining my life choices.

[C4RNIVOR3]

that's 130 hours you could have been playing something like hades and getting more content and enjoyment for that kind of time thank you for your legendary service

[Death Wish]

Oh my god... It took about 60 hours to complete all achievements in original game, a bit more than 100 hours in Dynasty and Samurai Warriors. But more than 100 hours of just Pure Grinding for 1 achievement... This is just over.. Well, i actually still enjoy this game and gonna finish this achievement too, but still... First i thought i gonna craft weapons for every character, but i think i gonna change my mind... Btw I've played about 60 hours since Ultimate released, which took some hours for storyline too, and at this moment I've got around 40 weapons crafted

[bzcharkl]

Well, it took me 130 hours, but I'm also quite certain others could get it faster, even if we assume some of the 0.2% before me were cheaters I really doubt I'm the first. If you have 40 in 60 hours you're probably already ahead of the curve compared to me.

[Death Wish]

It seems i gonna take more than 100 hours too. Even using some tips to easier and faster farming it takes so long. Also now I've got some problems with crystals, bcs they just spent. It would be better, if there was kind of material trading function. I don't know what developers was thinking about with this achievement...

[devilmalice]

I learned the hard way that crafting for same character twice don't count. So it's 100 weapons for 100 characters.