Topic: Xenoblade Series chat

@Ralizah It's interesting because I think most people who have played 2 have recognized how flawed the game is and its issues, but then still consider it to be a phenomenal game. It leads to some pretty interesting discussions, I think. I agree with the soundtrack so far; holy cow it is just banger after banger with the OST.

@Vortexeo Interesting! Fast overworld traversal is appealing to me in basically any game. It would be cool to see them return in a future game.

@StarPoint If you already like the soundtrack, you're going to absolutely adore it by the end.

The thing about the game's design and presentation flaws is that they're so obvious that it's difficult to defend them. Like, who actually enjoys the gacha blade system, especially when it blocks you from completing side quests? Or how poorly explained the game's combat is? Or the resolution dipping to 360p or whatever in Gormott when it's played undocked? Or the obviously unpolished way areas load in? On the other hand, the strengths of this game are obvious, too, and the late game narrative arc is the absolute best in the series. By the time you're late in the game, the gacha/field skill stuff is less of an issue, too. And the initially somewhat stark characterizations enjoy plenty of development and refinement, because nearly everyone in this game is interesting and broken in their own unique way.

OK, kind of a long story of where I am to get to my question. I'm at the final boss of chapter five the three-parter with the core where you have to attack the cables, then Jin, then just the core by itself . I finally had to somewhat cheat and look up a good strategy just for beating the first part because I was getting wasted out of nowhere, then beat the second part after a couple tries, then looked up again on the third part after getting wasted some more. Learned about building up orbs and breaking them, which I do not remember knowing about, and I'm a bit confused and want to see if I have this right. So if I do a level 3 attack, an orb of that element will be put on the enemy. Then when I do a chain attack, I will attack the orb. It requires 3 hits, but an attack from the opposite element counts as 2. If it breaks, it will lengthen the chain attack. Is this correct? Is there anything I'm missing or anything else I should know, because I tried it once since learning this and maybe did a little better but not much. Do they still get an orb with a level 4 attack, or does it have to be level 3? Is it better to limit it to 1 orb per chain attack or do multiple, because I think it said online that if there are multiple it will attack a random orb, so you are more likely to not break any (except an opposite element will attack the correct one, but then you have to make sure you have opposite element Blades). Any other strategies I may be missing?

@Xyphon22 If an enemy has multiple orbs around it and you choose a blade with an element that a particular orb is weak to, it should target that orb automatically. I believe it only randomly targets orbs if you choose a blade without an elemental attack one of the orbs is weak to.

I think this was the boss that finally forced me to look up battle system tutorials, because it's pretty much impossible to defeat without learning how to apply and burst orbs lol

@Ralizah I thought that was how it worked. So maybe the best strategy would be to keep doing level 3 attacks with Mythra, which will put electric orbs on the boss. Then make sure all 3 of my Drivers have at least 1 Earth Blade to counter the electric orb. (Or with any element, like using Pyra to make fire orbs and make sure everyone has a Water Blade, etc.) Is that basically how it works?

Also, what is the best way to fill up the 3-bar meter at the top? I usually have the bad luck/stupid timing of doing a chain attack and then the boss does a super powerful attack that takes me out when I have no bars to revive anyone.

@Xyphon22 It's not using a level 3 special that adds an orb, it's completing a blade combo or alternatively using a common blade's specials with the skill orb master. There are also aux cores that cause specials in a chain attack to automatically target the damaged ones.

@Xyphon22 You're pretty close!

Level 3 specials on their own won't produce the orb. You have to follow the element tree that's shown at the top right. You can see an example in this screenshot.

I didn't know what this tree did until after I beat the game lol. If you don't already know, the tree reads from left to right. In this example, the player started off with a level 1 earth special. If they wanted to place a wind orb on the enemy they would have to do Lvl 1 earth, lvl 2 fire, and then level 3 wind (This is called a blade combo). Whatever the third element is in the blade combo will be the element of the orb. You'll know you did a blade combo correctly if it has you do quick time events during the level 3 special.

What's worth noting is that the specials don't have to be EXACTLY the same level. They have to be the same level or higher. So to answer your question a level 4 special could function as a level 3.

You're correct on the orbs in chain attacks. Any orb placed on an enemy will appear in a chain attack and every orb has 3 hp. The combinations for the orbs are Fire & Water, Light & Dark, Ice & Wind, Earth & Electric. Elements used in a chain attack will always prioritize their counterpart. So if you had a fire orb, using a water attack will always prioritize the fire orb until it bursts, no matter how many orbs you have up. Using the opposite element will also deal 2 damage to an orb instead of 1. If you don't have the opposite element then it will attack an orb at random and only do 1 damage.

The number of orbs you should set up really depends on your party. If you build your party to cover every element then you should be able to put up to 8 orbs in a chain attack with no problem. However, I believe if you burst 5 orbs you'll be able to do something called a "full burst" so setting up all 8 orbs isn't always needed.

Now something worth noting: Don't burst more than 1 orb per round. Bursting orbs do extend the chain attack but even if you burst 3 orbs in one round of a chain attack, your chain attack will only extend once. If you want to get the most out of your chain attack, burst 1 orb every round.

Hopefully that makes sense lol, it's definitely a bit of a learning curve so if something I said doesn't make sense just lmk!

@Vortexeo Wow, that's a lot of info. Thanks. It all makes sense except for maybe the element tree. I've obviously seen that but never understood it or done anything with it. Also, I don't think I've ever done a level 3 special where it didn't have me do QTEs, so maybe by the time I've filled up my special gauge to level 3 it's usually just already been at the end of a combo? So I think I get the gist of it, just maybe not entirely how to set up combos properly, but they seem to just happen anyways.

@Xyphon22 I don't know if you've used any level four specials, if you have then you know it how it sort of cuts away from the battle (I don't know how to describe it.), a level 3 special at the end of a blade combo will do that as well.

@TeaCatherine Thanks. I've fought the guy like 5 more times and think I've finally basically figured it out. Unfortunately, it doesn't seem to be doing any good. I got one chain attack where I had 2 orbs, broke them both on different rounds, so got 3 rounds in and caused a ton of damage. Then literally within like 15-20 seconds of the chain attack ending it did some super attack and killed all three of us. Everyone in my party is much higher leveled than it, too (I think Zeke is 12 levels higher and Morag is 10), so I don't know what else I can do besides just keep trying. Is there a way to like use items/healing potions during battle? Because I can't figure that out either if there is. But I think I did finally figure out how to run during battle so I can chase down the HP bottles faster. Hopefully that will help.

I might have phrased that part incorrectly. I had a complete brain fart and forgot that pretty much all specials have QTEs lol. It's pretty much like how @TeaCatherine described it. When you do a blade combo correctly it looks more like a fancy cinematic that cuts away from the battle. The 18 second mark in this video is an example of what one of them looks like. It does the whole slow-mo and everything:

As for the element tree, it pretty much just shows you all the potential paths that you could take to form a blade combo. I modified the screenshot a little so maybe you could visualize it a little better. You start off with any level 1 special, then you have 2 potential options for a level 2 special. Depending on the level 2 element you choose you'll then have 2 potential options for a level 3 special. The level 3 will complete the blade combo and provide an orb.

@Vortexeo That was helpful, and I think I've finally figured it out. But do you basically just have to get lucky with one of your teammates doing either the level 2 or 3 attack in a timely manner? Because there doesn't seem to be any way you could do the level 2 and then fill up the gauge to level 3 again before the combo timer runs out. I know the ZL and ZR prompts pop up, but they don't seem to always do them properly.

@Xyphon22 There actually is a way to figure out what level special your teammates have. If you look at the first screenshot I had in my initial response you can see this white dot circling around Rex's icon. This also happens with your teammates. When their icon (ZL and ZR prompts) appears on screen you'll see those dots circling around their icon. One white dot means they're at level 1, 2 white dots mean level 2, and 3 dots mean level 3. In the original screenshot Tora has no dots which means his special hasn't built up to level 1 yet.

I don't think this was ever explained in the game so I only figured it out after I beat the main story lol. I'd recommend not using the prompts when they first show up. The way it normally works for me is that one teammate will use their level 1, I'll wait for the other teammate to get to level 2, and then Rex (or whatever character I'm playing) will use level 3.

@Vortexeo That's very interesting. Thanks for pointing that out. I'll see if I can take advantage of that next time I play.

@Xyphon22 No problem! Looking forward to hearing more about your playthrough!

Alright! I finally pulled it off. Thanks for everybody's help. I'd say it was because I forgot all of these things having taken a break from the game for so long, but it sounds like the game never explained them in the first place. I finally beat the final stage of the boss by just not going into the chain attack until I'd built up 3 orbs and gotten it down to half health, because it's at half health that these bosses seem to pull out their big attacks (noticing the white dots to know when to trigger the attacks was very helpful in building up the orbs, but it took me a couple of tries because I found it difficult to pay attention to both those dots and what I was doing so I ended up dying prematurely because I forgot to do attacks that spawned the HP bottles). I successfully broke one orb per round so I made the chain attack last 4 rounds. At the end of the fourth round it said "Overkill Start" which I don't know what that is or does, but I don't think it did anything because the boss' HP bar was already empty so it didn't need to.

So I guess I'm about halfway through the game now having finished chapter 5. It's crazy how much is in these games. I remember thinking the original Xenoblade was over about 10 times but it just kept going, and this seemed like story-wise (and time-wise) it could have easily been the end, but nope! It just keeps going.

@Xyphon22 Wooooo! Awesome job!

Overkill bonuses are one of my favorite mechanics in Xenoblade 2! They are great because they increase the rewards gained at the end of the battle. For example, if you land a 200% overkill bonus you gain 200% more exp from the enemy you killed. I love it because it reduces the need to grind levels! I've managed to get some really high overkill bonuses and level up multiple times from one battle. It's a lot of fun

@Vortexeo Ah, that makes sense. I guess I should have figured it out just by the name that it wouldn't take effect until the boss was already killed. So I guess it probably did do something. Well, I'm off to stop Bana from destroying the conference. It's so funny to see a Nopon be so evil in this game.

Just finished up chapter 6, and that was an interesting chapter. It was fun at first with the kind of Ace Attorney-lite investigation sequence (not sure what happens if you get any of the questions wrong, probably nothing, as I got them all right first try). And then being completely wrong was funny. But with Morag out of the group, I just couldn't beat Giga Rosa with only 2 party members until I finally gave up and looked up if you had to do it with only 2, and lo and behold, there was a way to re-add a third member. It was pretty easy after that. Then the required snow world was pretty neat, but not as beautiful as the ones in the previous games. I was highly disappointed in the final boss battle, though. Not only was it all people I had already fought before, I thought it was the easiest boss battle yet. I beat it on the first try, much to my surprise. Storywise, though, I thought this chapter was really good with losing Pyra, then saving her, then losing her again, although again I thought I would finally have to switch away from Rex without having Pyra, but it was still remarkably easy even without her. We'll see how it goes in chapter 7 without her . So overall a fun but easy chapter. On we go!

Update: Finished up chapter 7, and wow! Absolutely nothing in that chapter made a lick of sense. Like seriously, why is everybody actually a Blade? Did the writers just run out of ideas? And how can Nia have Blades if she is a Blade herself? And how can Malos essentially have his DNA and insides destroyed but show up 2 minutes later completely fine? And why was Mythra/Prya even still around if Addam is dead? And why is just an everyday Blade in Jin so much more powerful than even the Aegises? . And so much more, but that's just off the top of my head. And whatever that area under the monument at Fonsett is called is the worst/most annoying area ever, especially with the boss at the end of it. Glad to see this chapter over.

I’m currently about halfway through chapter 4 of Xenoblade 2. Specifically, the part where you’re investigating barrels to help find Tora’s dad. I’ve actually been enjoying my time with this game much more than I thought I would. The thing that makes me keep coming back is the combat. It’s confusing and complicated, sure, but once you get a hold of all of it’s systems, it’s incredibly rewarding. I especially love the Overkill mechanic when doing a Chain Attack since it nets you a ton of extra rewards and EXP, which means it’s great to use in boss fights since those already drop quite a lot of experience. On that same note, I’ve actually found leveling up to be much quicker in this game than in DE. Maybe I’ve just been batting more since the combat is more fun to me, but I’m already at a level 31, which seems pretty quick to me. But I don’t mind it though; I actually kind of like RPGs where you level up quickly and consistently. And I think being over leveled for certain fights is fun.

My two main issues with the game are some of the cringeworthy cutscenes and the field skills. I’ve already gotten to the Inn cutscene with Rex and Mythra, and the hot springs scene with Nia and Mythra. I think my biggest issue with these cutscenes apart from their fan-servicey nature is that they feel pointless. They just seem like a waste of time, and really don’t even help towards developing any of the characters. It seems like it’s meant to be comedic, but ultimately it’s just uncomfortable to watch, especially considering the ages of some of the characters.

The field skills, though, are another issue entirely. I think that they are incredibly annoying to come across, and the fact that they gate progression is nearly unforgivable for me. I can just barely tolerate it because it’s usually not too hard to level up Blade affinity. But I really dislike how if you get to a miasma cloud or a locked door and just can’t progress the story, you either have to grind a blade’s affinity which can take a while, hope you bond with a blade that has the skills you need, or send blades out on missions in some scenarios and wait 30 minutes. It’s such a substantial pace-killer in my mind since before these field skills are truly needed, the game moves at a pretty fast pace. But these checks slow it down to a halt for considerable amounts of time.

Fortunately, I am still really enjoying this game. I’m already more than a third of the way through and it really doesn’t feel like it yet; my time with it has gone by very quickly. And from what I’ve heard, the story only gets better from here, so hopefully that’ll turn out to be true and motivate me to finish it. I can absolutely see why this game is so divisive among fans, though. It has some fantastic things about it, and some not-so fantastic things all the same, to put it lightly.