Final Fantasy XIII Official Thread (56k, Reviews are in!)

I beat the game a couple days ago (it was good), and I'm now moving onto taking care of all the side-missions I previously wasn't able to beat. It's going kinda slow at the moment (grinding feels like it's taking forever now because of the crazy high CP costs), but I'm making progress. I think I've now uncovered all the locations you can visit on Pulse, as I don't see any other unexplored areas on the map.

I have done as many missions as I can at the moment on the plains of Pulse. I am sure I hit the same wall everyone else did, Cactuar. So I decided to progress the story by entering the mines. It's nice to have straight goal again to be honest. I am a bit overpowered as I am destroying everything in my path. But just when I was getting cocky an eideloin fight beats me down. I am now in this awesome tower, this is how you do an RPG dungeon.

I will say it again, this game is so beautiful. The locations you visit and things vistas you see, my god. It is one of the most beautiful game worlds I have ever seen.

Now that I have had control of my team for about 20 hours and I understand the weapon upgrading system and all that it feels more like FF. You need to grind to fight the tougher enemies but it isnt really required to get through the game. Back when it was totally linear the game always had control of how powerful your characters were. On one hand that is good cause the difficulty is perfectly balanced for everyone. On the other hand it removes the aspect of RPGs where you make your team stronger, where you can decided who and what to fight. In Pulse that comes back, when I arrived I fought a Behemoth and it would destory my team. 10 hours later I was beating those things down like nothing. I love finding a hidden path and being ambushed by some giant monster you know you can't beat at the moment. When I come back to kill it the satisfication will be great. If only this game had a proper mix of letting the player explore and having the game guide you like FF's of old, this game could have been one of the top FF games. Its still excellent and big time fans of FFX will be in heaven.

dvader654

It was funny that the GS review mentioned how bad that tower section was. I loved it.rragnaar

Wait, they did? Huh. I'll have to go read that review, I guess. Can't imagine why that section was a problem. I thought was great.

I'm halfway through chapter 13 now. I spent 17 hours in chapter 11 - I went all the way to nearly the very end then for some reason turned around and walked all the way back (thankfully that mission outside the tower opened a portal so my return to the end was a lot shorter), ended up finishing all three main classes available for each character and had over 300k CP banked by the time I beat the chapter's boss (enabling me to get all the new abilities instantly - man One Man Army OWNS yet the game never auto-selects it), and I'm sure to have all the three branches finished by the end of chapter 13. Chapter 12 is awesome from an action/chaos standpoint, but so far the final chapter/dungeon has been something of a yawn. Rather lengthy, uneventful, and man am I ever getting a Star Ocean 3 vibe from it.

Now I have to figure out what final weapons to get (I've haven't even upgraded a single thing yet, heh). There's not one ultimate weapon - each weapon ends up in an ultimate weapon with different strengths and weaknesses. I'm thinking the ATB charging one for Lightning, the buff/debuff duration ones for others, sentinel one for Snow, and so forth. Any thoughts? What did/will you all pick?

What did/will you all pick?

argianas

I didn't get any of the ultimate weapons before beating the game. Everything out there said to put it off making them until after you've finished the game, so I did. Not sure which weapons I'm gonna go with, though. I'll probably look at the weapon upgrade guides and make a decision based on what seems to have the best stats and abilities.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

What did/will you all pick?

c_rake

I didn't get any of the ultimate weapons before beating the game. Everything out there said to put it off making them until after you've finished the game, so I did. Not sure which weapons I'm gonna go with, though. I'll probably look at the weapon upgrade guides and make a decision based on what seems to have the best stats and abilities.

Yeah, I haven't touched weapons at all and won't until after I beat it. Feels weird beating a game on my first attempt with weapons I got in like chapter 2 or something, but that's the way it is.

Now I have to figure out what final weapons to get (I've haven't even upgraded a single thing yet, heh). There's not one ultimate weapon - each weapon ends up in an ultimate weapon with different strengths and weaknesses. I'm thinking the ATB charging one for Lightning, the buff/debuff duration ones for others, sentinel one for Snow, and so forth. Any thoughts? What did/will you all pick?

argianas

I just went with the standard Blazefire evolution for lightning since I liked the balance of magic/strength. I would just warn you in advance the ATB charge weapon for Lightning maxes out at 315/315 strength/magic.The Blazefire evolution is 620/620. There are two stronger evo's in terms of stats but I don't like the disadvantages tied to them - Ironstrike and Stagger Lock. Stagger Lock is fine on Fang, but not for a character like Lightning who often will play a Ravager. Still, the Axis evo (ATB boost) is not without it's advantages if you're thinking of Lightning as a pure chain booster and not a damage dealer. Army of One certainly plays into that...it's amazing for boosting the chain bonus. Not so much for getting the stagger, though.

Fang I went for pure damage with the Taming Pole which maxes at 921/921. Stagger lock not a problem as I said above, plus I have instant chain synthesized so she still gives me a surprise stagger every now and then.

Hope i chose the Vidofnir evo because the magic stat is fairly high and Defense Management works well with a guy that's casting buffs. But honestly Otshirvani (for building chain bonus) and Hawkeye (forthe very high magic stat)are good choices as well and I haven't really experimented with it too much.

Vanille is pretty much a Sab for me, so that was an easy pick with the Belladonna evo, boosting her debuffs.

Sazh is irritating and I rarely use him outside of adamantoise death spell farming.

Snow I went with the Paladin because of Improved Guard. I subbed him in for the Attacus fight at the end of Faultwarrens and he just sponged damage to the point where he didn't actually start losing life until Attacus' third sword transformation. So instantly I was like, "there's your strength right there, Snow." Comparatively, Fang was getting mauled on the first sword form, forcing me to switch to a Medic fairly often.

Also, the Gigantaur was a pain even after beating the game, which is probably why there is a trophy specifically for beating him - Floraphobe. I won't say he's hard, just that stats are likely not going to save you if you're running the wrong paradigm, unless you've really beefed up your accesory collection. I might have beat him in Chapter 11, but I was overthinking it...thinking I had to do it one way, and to do it that way, I figured I needed better stats. I'm sure the stats helped but in the end the paradigm and using techniques at the right moment helped a lot more.

[QUOTE="rragnaar"]I just did the big boss fight at the end of Chapter 11 last night. I'm waffling on whether I want to go forward and beat the game, or if I want to keep screwing around. I leveled up my Axis Blade all the way last night. I'm not too crazy about it. I hear there is a better sword near the start of Chapter 12, so I'll keep my eye out for it. Which characters are people using in their parties? I mostly just use Lightning, Fang and Hope. I like that I can have Lightning attacking at the beginning of a tough fight while Fang and Hope do the whole Saboteur/Synergist thing, and Fang is an awesome Sentinel.dvader654

Beat the game last night, and am now working on post-game stuff. Just got chocobos, Got tier 2 maxxed weapons for my three main people, and I'm closing in on maxing out my first class for each person.

Ish, I think I'm going to go with what you did for ultimate weapons except for Fang, I'm using her debuff weapon since the stats are about 150 strength less and the same magic just about, and the 40% increase in landing debuffs is nice since I use that a lot. Then again I haven't started to farm the items for ultimates yet so I still have time to change my mind.

I'm also using the group that Rag is using, and in fact have been doing so just about constantly since I got the ability to form my party. That party is just so versitile. I only really use the other three for specific situations at this point. Really once Hope gets Haste in Stage 9 of the sphere tree thingie, there's no real weaknesses for most encounters.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

Beat the game last night, and am now working on post-game stuff. Just got chocobos, Got tier 2 maxxed weapons for my three main people, and I'm closing in on maxing out my first class for each person.

Ish, I think I'm going to go with what you did for ultimate weapons except for Fang, I'm using her debuff weapon since the stats are about 150 strength less and the same magic just about, and the 40% increase in landing debuffs is nice since I use that a lot. Then again I haven't started to farm the items for ultimates yet so I still have time to change my mind.

I'm also using the group that Rag is using, and in fact have been doing so just about constantly since I got the ability to form my party. That party is just so versitile. I only really use the other three for specific situations at this point. Really once Hope gets Haste in Stage 9 of the sphere tree thingie, there's no real weaknesses for most encounters.

dvader654

Judging by your trophies it seems you're still screwing around in chapter 11 (very slight progression spoilers ahead. FYI, if you beat the chapter boss Stage 9 of the grid unlocks but unlike other chapters you don't automatically move on to the next chapter until you click something. So if you want to stay behind and use haste in side questing, there's that. Or you can just return anytime from the start of chapter 13 onwards.

The opening cutscene for Chapter 12 is amazing, and my god, the environment in general looks like CG. I just grabbed the Lionheart. I think that will be my main weapon for Lightning.rragnaar

Oh yeah, I found Chapter 12 in general to be kickass. Unfortunately Chapter 13 was something of a letdown for me, at least compared to what I experienced in the previous chapter. Oh well.

[QUOTE="rragnaar"]The opening cutscene for Chapter 12 is amazing, and my god, the environment in general looks like CG. I just grabbed the Lionheart. I think that will be my main weapon for Lightning.argianas

Oh yeah, I found Chapter 12 in general to be kickass. Unfortunately Chapter 13 was something of a letdown for me, at least compared to what I experienced in the previous chapter. Oh well.

Yeah, chapter 13 was pretty underwhelming after the awesomeness of chapter 12. Though, to be fair, chapter 12 is a tough act to follow, so I suppose it inevitable that chapter 13 wouldn't be as good.

when i heard that there were battle screens again, i had visions of ffx where the screen shatters and forms an alternate reality of vast flat planes where adversaries line up in perfect rows and alternate bashing each other from these stagnant positions. ffxiii handles it much better. the screen fades for just a moment as the camera adjusts and everybody takes dynamic formations that change as the battle unfolds.LoG-Sacrament

I really appreciated that too, it was a nice touch. One of the main gripes I have with FF12 is that the battles looked very flat, and non dynamic. No battle felt or looked epic or particularly special, a fight was a fight was a fight. All of it was the same. FF13 brought the cinematic and epic back into battle with style, and I love it.

Ish, I think I'm going to go with what you did for ultimate weapons except for Fang, I'm using her debuff weapon since the stats are about 150 strength less and the same magic just about, and the 40% increase in landing debuffs is nice since I use that a lot. Then again I haven't started to farm the items for ultimates yet so I still have time to change my mind.

argianas

I thought the ultimate upgrade on that set was 300 strength points less? I haven't made it myself; just glancing at a chart. Still, it would work well for Adamantoise farming because Fang's Curse spell seems to help greatly in triggering a success with Vanille's Death spell, but without the Pandoran spear or its upgrades, I tend to miss about 3 or 4 turns before she can land a successful Curse. And in general, just the fact all her sab spells are AoE makes her a very good sab for common fights.

Personally, there are at least two weapons per character that I like and I'd love if we could switch weapons mid battle. Maybe if you could somehow assign weapons to particular roles so that when the character's role changed at paradigm switch, their weapon would, too. As it stands, I'd love to run the Lionheart forms with Lightning as Ravager. I probably wouldn't even take it to ultimate, just the second level because it's a gestalt weapon and I'd synthesize instant chain with it. Then have a Hauteclaire assigned to her when she's a commando. As it stands, I just stick to the Blazefire because the other two are too specialized for the way I use Light.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

Ish, I think I'm going to go with what you did for ultimate weapons except for Fang, I'm using her debuff weapon since the stats are about 150 strength less and the same magic just about, and the 40% increase in landing debuffs is nice since I use that a lot. Then again I haven't started to farm the items for ultimates yet so I still have time to change my mind.

Ish_basic

I thought the ultimate upgrade on that set was 300 strength points less? I haven't made it myself; just glancing at a chart. Still, it would work well for Adamantoise farming because Fang's Curse spell seems to help greatly in triggering a success with Vanille's Death spell, but without the Pandoran spear or its upgrades, I tend to miss about 3 or 4 turns before she can land a successful Curse. And in general, just the fact all her sab spells are AoE makes her a very good sab for common fights.

Personally, there are at least two weapons per character that I like and I'd love if we could switch weapons mid battle. Maybe if you could somehow assign weapons to particular roles so that when the character's role changed at paradigm switch, their weapon would, too. As it stands, I'd love to run the Lionheart forms with Lightning as Ravager. I probably wouldn't even take it to ultimate, just the second level because it's a gestalt weapon and I'd synthesize instant chain with it. Then have a Hauteclaire assigned to her when she's a commando. As it stands, I just stick to the Blazefire because the other two are too specialized for the way I use Light.

Actually you're right, looking at it more closely and it's about 305 less. Still, not sure what to do. I guess in this game there's the burden of choice - I'm so used to having one ultimate weapon that are better than the others (FF7 being the only exception due to the no materia growth). Now I have to pick. To make matters worse, like you said, weapons are better in different roles. I mean for Fang the debuff spear is great as a saboteur, the counter one for sentinel, and the stagger lock one for commando, but it's not uncommon to switch between these during a single fight. I'm still leaning towards the debuff one, but again I haven't gotten one of those upgrade materials yet. I'm also considering getting the quick stagger weapon for Lightning instead of the basic one, as I'll be losing 112 str/mag for staggering at a lower point. I'm fighting enough enemies with high chain resistance that I think the low stat drop will be worth it.

Awesome, I can now farm Adamantortoises without having to recharge TP between battles - I'm just straight up killing them. Ironically all that I seem to be doing differently is controlling Fang instead of Lightning. Got 4 stars on the weaker ones and 5 on the stronger ones. Things are looking up! Also did all missions except 62 (because I want to leave the Adamantortoises there to farm for the time being) and 64. Still looking for my first Trap though. (Edit: Got the weaker ones down to a 5-star farm now too.)

Awesome, I can now farm Adamantortoises without having to recharge TP between battles - I'm just straight up killing them. Ironically all that I seem to be doing differently is controlling Fang instead of Lightning. Got 4 stars on the weaker ones and 5 on the stronger ones. Things are looking up! Also did all missions except 62 (because I want to leave the Adamantortoises there to farm for the time being) and 64. Still looking for my first Trap though. (Edit: Got the weaker ones down to a 5-star farm now too.)

argianas

Did you do the mark that gets you the Growth Egg? The stone is on top of the school in Oerba. It's Neochu...can be easily killed with one of Vanille's death spell sessions, otherwise it's kind of annoying. But it doubles the CP earned for all party members. So you'd be netting around 80k CP for each of those adamantortoises.

I'm actually stuck farming the adamantoise in Eden since all I got are Long Gui's runningaround. Little harder than the tortoise and you don't really get any more for it....oh well. Getting sick of all the grinding I need to do just to max out the crystariums. The bonuses for the secondary roles just aren't worth the CP investment but the role crystals are and I feel like I need them for the final mark. That and better items, which also takes forever. Damn Kaiser knuckles and their dark matter catalyst.

Also, you're probably just going to end up buying your first trap. Remember, if you turn Vanille's Malboro wand into a Nirvana with it, max that out (for about 1.5 million to level it to 100 using sturdy bones and Ultracompact Reactors) then dismantle it, you'll get three traps back. It's worth it. I still haven't had one of those drop, but the drop rate is actually five times better on the Long Gui....which is like 10 times harder to kill and I'd hesitate to do battle with one without already having ultimates.

Beat the game last night. That last section before the final boss was absolutely awful. Fight after fight after fight, mostly with enemies who where blatant damage sponges who served no purpose beyond artificially increasing play time and challenge. That "merciless judgement" move the final boss uses was also blatantly cheap. Most times it took me down to a bare minimum of health, and I recovered quickly with the salvation paradigm. But at random times, twice when he was nearly dead, he would use it on me, and for some reason it would take absolutely all of my health, a one hit kill, from full health. Which is just plain absurd. I almost gave up and turned the game in, it was unimaginably frustrating, and almost ruined the entire game for me.

I enjoyed the game overall, but that last section and the boss out a big fat black eye on this Mona Lisa. She's still oddly attractive in a mysterious way, but man that black eye is hard not to notice.

Just entered chapter 13. I heard horrible things about it, I will speed through it just to get the game done. Then the real fun begins. I feel so overpowered right now, I flew through chapter 12. So how long is chapter 13?dvader654

Around the same length of chapter 12, I'd say. It's a little tougher, though, so it may take just a tad longer to get through it. It all depends on how many enemies you fight, really.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

Awesome, I can now farm Adamantortoises without having to recharge TP between battles - I'm just straight up killing them. Ironically all that I seem to be doing differently is controlling Fang instead of Lightning. Got 4 stars on the weaker ones and 5 on the stronger ones. Things are looking up! Also did all missions except 62 (because I want to leave the Adamantortoises there to farm for the time being) and 64. Still looking for my first Trap though. (Edit: Got the weaker ones down to a 5-star farm now too.)

Ish_basic

Did you do the mark that gets you the Growth Egg? The stone is on top of the school in Oerba. It's Neochu...can be easily killed with one of Vanille's death spell sessions, otherwise it's kind of annoying. But it doubles the CP earned for all party members. So you'd be netting around 80k CP for each of those adamantortoises.

I'm actually stuck farming the adamantoise in Eden since all I got are Long Gui's runningaround. Little harder than the tortoise and you don't really get any more for it....oh well. Getting sick of all the grinding I need to do just to max out the crystariums. The bonuses for the secondary roles just aren't worth the CP investment but the role crystals are and I feel like I need them for the final mark. That and better items, which also takes forever. Damn Kaiser knuckles and their dark matter catalyst.

Also, you're probably just going to end up buying your first trap. Remember, if you turn Vanille's Malboro wand into a Nirvana with it, max that out (for about 1.5 million to level it to 100 using sturdy bones and Ultracompact Reactors) then dismantle it, you'll get three traps back. It's worth it. I still haven't had one of those drop, but the drop rate is actually five times better on the Long Gui....which is like 10 times harder to kill and I'd hesitate to do battle with one without already having ultimates.

Actually I got three Traps so far just from a handful of hours of farming. Made Fang's and Vanille's weapons, didn't break them down yet because I have no idea if gil or Traps will be the bottleneck in the end, and hell it's not like I'm having trouble killing these things (if I hit 3 minutes, then I screwed up, and I'm playing conservatively as it is). Gave the beefier Adam a try and he fell just as fast as the ones I'm farming. Still I have a nice pattern going, killing two Adams per cycle, taking me 9 minutes (sometimes 8) altogether when you factor in saving, reloading, and running. In an hour I was getting a million CP (maxxed out my characters so CP isn't an issue anymore), roughly 750k gil, and maybe 0.4 traps. Seems the traps are falling at about the rate of the money I'd need regardless.

While the CP per stat ratio isn't good for secondary roles, some of the characters are actually very good at them. Hope and Vanille actually own as commandos, because ruin works just as well as attack does (maybe better since you don't waste time running). Lightning is just as good of a buffer as Hope is, and she actually replaced him for that role in my group since he heals better. I ended up ditching Hope for Vanille (since she has her weapon and he doesn't), and I'm rolling even more now. Oh man Fang's Highwind takes down forelegs like nobody's business, and against a staggered adam with full buffs and debuffs Fang and Vanille are doing about 125k per attack/ruin (times six).

Oddly when you finish levelling everyone they all have a multiple of a thousand as their max HP except Vanille, who has 21050. Seems Square screwed up there. Plus all characters' base str and magic are multiples of a hundred except Fang's 2005.

Beat the game last night. That last section before the final boss was absolutely awful. Fight after fight after fight, mostly with enemies who where blatant damage sponges who served no purpose beyond artificially increasing play time and challenge. That "merciless judgement" move the final boss uses was also blatantly cheap. Most times it took me down to a bare minimum of health, and I recovered quickly with the salvation paradigm. But at random times, twice when he was nearly dead, he would use it on me, and for some reason it would take absolutely all of my health, a one hit kill, from full health. Which is just plain absurd. I almost gave up and turned the game in, it was unimaginably frustrating, and almost ruined the entire game for me.

SteveTabernacle

Last Boss has the ability to inflict death with that attack, which is why putting items on to resist death is highly recommended, especially on your main character. Sacrifices also have this ability but you might not have fought enough of them to see it and so be aware of it as an issue in the game's latter stages. It's lame, yes, but when you stagger said boss' final form you can use death on him to end the fight quickly, so you can always give him a taste of his own medicine and possibly earn a gold trophy in the process.

Argianas..seriously, my luck with loot drops in gamesis awful (nothing new...*thinks of Guild Wars*). As many as I've killed I only ever got one to drop. But I really just need money at this point and the ingot drop rate has been terrible for me lately. I'm beginning to think the catalogs actually decrease drop rates. it's listed as 1 in 4 and it's been more like 1 in 12.

Also, yeah, the abilities and role levels for secondaries are very useful. I mean, spells like Shellra are so invaluable it's a wonder they don't appear for characters like Hope or Sazh. I just hate that I have to spend 30 or 60k on +9 str.

Got a few more Traps today... then I got no luck. In the last 16 I killed (I'm down to an 8-minute cycle, so I'm getting 15 kills per hour) I got 1 Ingot. As I suspected, gil is more of a bottleneck than the traps - I get enough gil to fully upgrade a weapon in the time I get a trap, but obviously I need gil to upgrade other weapons (most likely for the catalysts, which I don't have a ton of) and the accessories. Fortunately I already bought the Gilgamesh weapons, which ate up over a million themselves.

I don't know what to think of the -ra buffs. To some extent I don't like them as I have to reapply them more often, and I use two Synergists to speed up buffing a lot but if one has regular buffs and the other -ra, then the first would cast the buff then the other would overwrite it with the -ra buff a second later, killing the entire speed advantage. Then again, seeing Fang hit for 175k a pop on a fully staggered/debuffed Adam is so nice.

Also, of the numerous times I've had Death cast on me, it only landed once (on Hope during a fight against one Sacrifice). I don't know if I've been lucky or if my well-developed characters have a good natural resistance to it, but it was nice that I didn't have to worry about it at all.

Got a few more Traps today... then I got no luck. In the last 16 I killed (I'm down to an 8-minute cycle, so I'm getting 15 kills per hour) I got 1 Ingot. As I suspected, gil is more of a bottleneck than the traps - I get enough gil to fully upgrade a weapon in the time I get a trap, but obviously I need gil to upgrade other weapons (most likely for the catalysts, which I don't have a ton of) and the accessories. Fortunately I already bought the Gilgamesh weapons, which ate up over a million themselves.

I don't know what to think of the -ra buffs. To some extent I don't like them as I have to reapply them more often, and I use two Synergists to speed up buffing a lot but if one has regular buffs and the other -ra, then the first would cast the buff then the other would overwrite it with the -ra buff a second later, killing the entire speed advantage. Then again, seeing Fang hit for 175k a pop on a fully staggered/debuffed Adam is so nice.

Also, of the numerous times I've had Death cast on me, it only landed once (on Hope during a fight against one Sacrifice). I don't know if I've been lucky or if my well-developed characters have a good natural resistance to it, but it was nice that I didn't have to worry about it at all.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

Got a few more Traps today... then I got no luck. In the last 16 I killed (I'm down to an 8-minute cycle, so I'm getting 15 kills per hour) I got 1 Ingot. As I suspected, gil is more of a bottleneck than the traps - I get enough gil to fully upgrade a weapon in the time I get a trap, but obviously I need gil to upgrade other weapons (most likely for the catalysts, which I don't have a ton of) and the accessories. Fortunately I already bought the Gilgamesh weapons, which ate up over a million themselves.

I don't know what to think of the -ra buffs. To some extent I don't like them as I have to reapply them more often, and I use two Synergists to speed up buffing a lot but if one has regular buffs and the other -ra, then the first would cast the buff then the other would overwrite it with the -ra buff a second later, killing the entire speed advantage. Then again, seeing Fang hit for 175k a pop on a fully staggered/debuffed Adam is so nice.

Also, of the numerous times I've had Death cast on me, it only landed once (on Hope during a fight against one Sacrifice). I don't know if I've been lucky or if my well-developed characters have a good natural resistance to it, but it was nice that I didn't have to worry about it at all.

dvader654

Shell is a buff that increases your magic resistance. Shellra is a buff that significantly increases your magic resistance but lasts much shorter.

As for everything, I'd certainly think that you should be pretty loaded out in your three main roles for each character, since the stat/CP ratio is pretty good for them. As for weapons, I literally didn't upgrade my weapons at all until a bit after I beat the game. So with no weapon work and decent character progression, I was able to beat every mission that I tried (I'm sure I can do 62, not sure how 64 will turn out since I haven't faced it at all yet). I do think that the marks are easier than FF12 (then again the FF12 marks were available throughout the game and sometimes I was undereleveled but man they turned out being fun fights). The difficulty this time around is often 5-starring them, and even then it isn't hard with luck due to instant chain and death occasionally kicking in and making short work of enemies.

Got a few more Traps today... then I got no luck. In the last 16 I killed (I'm down to an 8-minute cycle, so I'm getting 15 kills per hour) I got 1 Ingot. As I suspected, gil is more of a bottleneck than the traps - I get enough gil to fully upgrade a weapon in the time I get a trap, but obviously I need gil to upgrade other weapons (most likely for the catalysts, which I don't have a ton of) and the accessories. Fortunately I already bought the Gilgamesh weapons, which ate up over a million themselves.

I don't know what to think of the -ra buffs. To some extent I don't like them as I have to reapply them more often, and I use two Synergists to speed up buffing a lot but if one has regular buffs and the other -ra, then the first would cast the buff then the other would overwrite it with the -ra buff a second later, killing the entire speed advantage. Then again, seeing Fang hit for 175k a pop on a fully staggered/debuffed Adam is so nice.

Also, of the numerous times I've had Death cast on me, it only landed once (on Hope during a fight against one Sacrifice). I don't know if I've been lucky or if my well-developed characters have a good natural resistance to it, but it was nice that I didn't have to worry about it at all.

argianas

At one point I had over 6 million Gil in a relatively short time farming these things and now the ingots just don't drop. I got another trap. Which made me again wonder what kind of JRPG logic would lead to the most expensive and rare items in the game (catalysts) having the worst sell values. Items usually sell for half of what you buy them for, but not catalysts...no, 2 million trap sells for 10k. If a trap sold for 1 million I might actually be excited about getting another one. I've unequipped my catalogs, so we'll see if that helps my ingot drop rate.

I like the ra buffs because I use them to farm adams quickly, before they can get back up. I usually kill them in about 1:30 so no recasting required. I kinda like finishing them off with a Highwind and seeing that 999,999 flash across the screen. Complete overkill at that point, but it's a fun sight.

Dark matter is going to be the difficult thing for me. Either I go for farming Shao Long Guis for them or I stick to trying to buy them with money from Ingots. But I think I need about 5 or so to finish making all the items in the game. Plus, I need one for each Kaiser knuckle/crest/wurzite bangle or whatever it's called to beef up my characters. I think I should just try Mark 64, see how hard it actually is before I start trying to make multiple top tier magic, strength and HP boosters. I might be over preparing. But I'm pretty sure a maxed crystarium or very near to it is a requisite for the fight, just judging by every strategy I've ever seen recommends a full deck of triple paradigms...Med+Med+Med, etc.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

Got a few more Traps today... then I got no luck. In the last 16 I killed (I'm down to an 8-minute cycle, so I'm getting 15 kills per hour) I got 1 Ingot. As I suspected, gil is more of a bottleneck than the traps - I get enough gil to fully upgrade a weapon in the time I get a trap, but obviously I need gil to upgrade other weapons (most likely for the catalysts, which I don't have a ton of) and the accessories. Fortunately I already bought the Gilgamesh weapons, which ate up over a million themselves.

I don't know what to think of the -ra buffs. To some extent I don't like them as I have to reapply them more often, and I use two Synergists to speed up buffing a lot but if one has regular buffs and the other -ra, then the first would cast the buff then the other would overwrite it with the -ra buff a second later, killing the entire speed advantage. Then again, seeing Fang hit for 175k a pop on a fully staggered/debuffed Adam is so nice.

Also, of the numerous times I've had Death cast on me, it only landed once (on Hope during a fight against one Sacrifice). I don't know if I've been lucky or if my well-developed characters have a good natural resistance to it, but it was nice that I didn't have to worry about it at all.

Ish_basic

At one point I had over 6 million Gil in a relatively short time farming these things and now the ingots just don't drop. I got another trap. Which made me again wonder what kind of JRPG logic would lead to the most expensive and rare items in the game (catalysts) having the worst sell values. Items usually sell for half of what you buy them for, but not catalysts...no, 2 million trap sells for 10k. If a trap sold for 1 million I might actually be excited about getting another one. I've unequipped my catalogs, so we'll see if that helps my ingot drop rate.

I like the ra buffs because I use them to farm adams quickly, before they can get back up. I usually kill them in about 1:30 so no recasting required. I kinda like finishing them off with a Highwind and seeing that 999,999 flash across the screen. Complete overkill at that point, but it's a fun sight.

Dark matter is going to be the difficult thing for me. Either I go for farming Shao Long Guis for them or I stick to trying to buy them with money from Ingots. But I think I need about 5 or so to finish making all the items in the game. Plus, I need one for each Kaiser knuckle/crest/wurzite bangle or whatever it's called to beef up my characters. I think I should just try Mark 64, see how hard it actually is before I start trying to make multiple top tier magic, strength and HP boosters. I might be over preparing. But I'm pretty sure a maxed crystarium or very near to it is a requisite for the fight, just judging by every strategy I've ever seen recommends a full deck of triple paradigms...Med+Med+Med, etc.

We'll see soon. I just finished farming the adams (I think) so I killed mark 62, spawning the Long Guis. I need to farm the babies for a handful of Dark Matters to finish my items (may need a little extra cash, we'll see, but I did finish all the weapons tonight minus the Sazh one that needs Dark Matter so it's down to upgrading accessories), so I'll be attempting mark 64 soon enough, likely sometime tomorrow (today). So one mark left, a little bit of farming (plus a Long Gui kill), and going back to 5-star stuff. The 5-star marks won't be too bad to get (never used the shrouds so getting a sneak attack on some may be huge, not to mention the Gold Watch for all those 4-star ones I got), plus some key ones I already got thanks to some rather fortunate instant chains. Man I love that ability. Toss in Lightning's quick stagger and sometimes she hits an enemy with very resistant chain gauges and boom, instant stagger (was so nice fighting those two magic enemies in mark 62).

so what exactly do role levels do? my only guess is that the role trait (damage for commandos, healing potency for medics, etc...) gets a little better, but im not sure.LoG-Sacrament

Pretty much. Commando is damage (2.0x for level 1 to 2.5x for level 5), synergist is buff duration, sab is the effect multiplier of the debuff, sent is damage received modifier, medic is healing, and ravager is how quickly the chain bonus is. Also, not only does it affect you but it also affects to a lesser extent your teammates (a teammate of a level 5 commando will do 1.15x their damage, teammate of a level 5 sentinel will receive 0.86x damage, etc.). Some late enemies depend on switching to three sentinels, as they have a 0.5x damage, plus two 0.86x damage.

Anyway I beat the Long Gui on my first try, and started farming Shaolong Guis (man they love to spam Ultima when they get low on life, which had killed my full HP Fang when I selected the wrong paradigm - three Sentinels can be so useful). Also 5-starred the final mark on my first try. I'm not sure you really need to totally max out your cry-whatever, but man there's one simple spell that almost wins the fight alone, at which point it's more about weathering the storm (which can get hectic in the final third of his life). So really I just need to get some Dark Matters and go back and 5-star some stuff and I'm done - did kill every enemy available. To some extent the selection of post-game boss is easier than in other FF's. On one hand I'm happy that they make some spells that don't tend to work on anything other than early game enemies work on almsot everything (hi Death!), but on the flip side it can really make 5-starring some encounters simple.

Arg, I didn't realize that all the oretoises would change to long gui variations once I finished the final circle hunt :( No Adamantoise hunting for me, I suppose. Is there another way to get money fast, and even though the Ochu works, isn't there some other way to get experience fast? Got to level up to beat the Titan trials.

Arg, I didn't realize that all the oretoises would change to long gui variations once I finished the final circle hunt :( No Adamantoise hunting for me, I suppose. Is there another way to get money fast, and even though the Ochu works, isn't there some other way to get experience fast? Got to level up to beat the Titan trials.

calvinsora

There's still the adamantoise in chapter 12 in front of the save point. Kill, save, reload, repeat.

Honestly if you can beat the circle hunts, you can probably take care of the Titan ones. There's one path that's annoying (the far left) due to the triple Tonberry, but one of the harder end bosses is what you fought two of in the later circle hunt.

Arg, I didn't realize that all the oretoises would change to long gui variations once I finished the final circle hunt :( No Adamantoise hunting for me, I suppose. Is there another way to get money fast, and even though the Ochu works, isn't there some other way to get experience fast? Got to level up to beat the Titan trials.

calvinsora

There's still one Adamantoise in Gran Pulse after completing all those missions; and he's near a save point too. You should be able to find him in that area where all the Wyverns are flying about.

Anyway I beat the Long Gui on my first try, and started farming Shaolong Guis (man they love to spam Ultima when they get low on life, which had killed my full HP Fang when I selected the wrong paradigm - three Sentinels can be so useful). Also 5-starred the final mark on my first try. I'm not sure you really need to totally max out your cry-whatever, but man there's one simple spell that almost wins the fight alone, at which point it's more about weathering the storm (which can get hectic in the final third of his life). So really I just need to get some Dark Matters and go back and 5-star some stuff and I'm done - did kill every enemy available. To some extent the selection of post-game boss is easier than in other FF's. On one hand I'm happy that they make some spells that don't tend to work on anything other than early game enemies work on almsot everything (hi Death!), but on the flip side it can really make 5-starring some encounters simple.

argianas

which spell is that that makes Mark 64 easy? I still haven't tried it. I started farming Dark Matter. All I can say is just use slow at the beginning of the battle and the shaolong Guis are a total pushover...no more back-to-back ultima-quake spam or losing stagger time because you need to turtle or heal. Under3 minutes, so really not much more time than farming the adams.

I think I need a total of six dark matter. Only got one to drop so far.

[QUOTE="argianas"]

Anyway I beat the Long Gui on my first try, and started farming Shaolong Guis (man they love to spam Ultima when they get low on life, which had killed my full HP Fang when I selected the wrong paradigm - three Sentinels can be so useful). Also 5-starred the final mark on my first try. I'm not sure you really need to totally max out your cry-whatever, but man there's one simple spell that almost wins the fight alone, at which point it's more about weathering the storm (which can get hectic in the final third of his life). So really I just need to get some Dark Matters and go back and 5-star some stuff and I'm done - did kill every enemy available. To some extent the selection of post-game boss is easier than in other FF's. On one hand I'm happy that they make some spells that don't tend to work on anything other than early game enemies work on almsot everything (hi Death!), but on the flip side it can really make 5-starring some encounters simple.

Ish_basic

which spell is that that makes Mark 64 easy? I still haven't tried it. I started farming Dark Matter. All I can say is just use slow at the beginning of the battle and the shaolong Guis are a total pushover...no more back-to-back ultima-quake spam or losing stagger time because you need to turtle or heal. Under3 minutes, so really not much more time than farming the adams.

I think I need a total of six dark matter. Only got one to drop so far.

Don't read the rest of this sentence if you don't want to be spoiled for mark 64. Anyway, the spell is poison. Here it does damage proportional to the enemy's max hp, and the mark has 15 million so it rips right through him. It'll do most of the work for you.

As for the Shaolong Guis, yeah I found out that slow is key, and I kill them between under 2 minutes and as long as 3.5 if I get bad luck. Got 4 DM's in about two hours tops so no complaints there. Down to needing to upgrade 5 accessories.

As for the Shaolong Guis, yeah I found out that slow is key, and I kill them between under 2 minutes and as long as 3.5 if I get bad luck. Got 4 DM's in about two hours tops so no complaints there. Down to needing to upgrade 5 accessories.

argianas

yeah, the guide says to use that spell, but then it goes on with this elaborate strategy. Really, all you need is the spell if you just want to beat it. Then just turtle after you get it applied.

I only got 3 stars, even though I was 3 minutes under the target time. Never could get the guy staggered..I mean, he'd be staggered for literally a second, then he'd go into his aura just about as soon as it happened. My instant chains never triggered. It's a pretty easy fight, though. I honestly don't feel like going back to 5 star everything. Conquering the last enemy in the game pretty much left me with zero motivation to do anything else.

[QUOTE="calvinsora"]

Arg, I didn't realize that all the oretoises would change to long gui variations once I finished the final circle hunt :( No Adamantoise hunting for me, I suppose. Is there another way to get money fast, and even though the Ochu works, isn't there some other way to get experience fast? Got to level up to beat the Titan trials.

argianas

There's still the adamantoise in chapter 12 in front of the save point. Kill, save, reload, repeat.

Honestly if you can beat the circle hunts, you can probably take care of the Titan ones. There's one path that's annoying (the far left) due to the triple Tonberry, but one of the harder end bosses is what you fought two of in the later circle hunt.

Ah yes, forgot about that one, thanks :D

I think the only Titan Trial I'll have trouble with is the Neochu, I've managed to beat one but that was with the death spell and some luck on my side.

[QUOTE="calvinsora"]

Arg, I didn't realize that all the oretoises would change to long gui variations once I finished the final circle hunt :( No Adamantoise hunting for me, I suppose. Is there another way to get money fast, and even though the Ochu works, isn't there some other way to get experience fast? Got to level up to beat the Titan trials.

Kuromino

There's still one Adamantoise in Gran Pulse after completing all those missions; and he's near a save point too. You should be able to find him in that area where all the Wyverns are flying about.

OK, I'll check that out. Thanks :)