Mille Marteaux
greyhound bus
- Guildcard
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PSO is a very, very old game. Perhaps you played PSO2 first for the waifu dressup, or because friends asked you to, and after killing Gal Gryphon for the ten thousandth time, you decided to look into the predecessor only to realize that the only real similar elements are that some of the classes are familiar and that it's an action RPG. This thread is here to help ease you into the culture shock of traveling back in time.
I'm not saying this game is bad by any means. It's still a wonderful experience, don't get me wrong. However, PSO2 and PSOBB have a lot of core differences in gameplay that simply knowing will make your time starting out much easier.
If you are looking for a guide about specifics on classes or certain enemies, this is not the thread for you. I recommend visiting this thread instead for now - this is entirely for the people coming in from PSO2 so they know what they're getting into.
-- Your attacks can miss due to accuracy and evasion
You have an accuracy stat in this game. If you decide to shout "YOLO" and blindly charge into an enemy spamming Heavy attacks to make it die faster, you will only see a red MISS pop up and your character will soon hit the floor. However, Techniques ignore accuracy and evasion, instead scaling off elemental resistances. I'll talk more about combos and techniques later, though.
-- Meseta is relatively worthless, Photon Drops (PDs) are extremely valuable
Meseta is not used to purchase ANYTHING from other players that has actual value. Instead, it is mostly just used to fuel the Charge special. Anything of value is usually measured in PD value.
PDs are rare drops that can drop from anything and everything, and are very likely to be among the first rares you find. Hold onto these - your first purchase should either be a Mag or a Heavenly/Battle in order to make your attacks not slow as molasses.
-- Shifta is extremely, EXTREMELY good
All buffs and debuffs are, really. Shifta can make you clear spawns twice as fast. Even at level 15 from the RAmar, Shifta adds a lot of damage, so if you're the only player in a group with access to Shifta, then cast it on yourself and your allies to drastically improve your performance. Similarly, if you're the only player with Zalure, cast it on enemies as well. Combined with Shifta, enemies will die much, much faster than they would have without the debuff.
-- All items that you have to tek can have their percentages increased by 10%
All weapons that have to be tekked can have their percentages modified in the following manners:
-10%
-5%
No change
+5%
+10%
Non-rare weapons with specials (???? Saber) can also have their level of special attack increase or decrease as well, so non-rares can be a nightmare to get perfect stats on. Charge, Spirit, and Berserk do not have multiple levels, however.
In general, you want to keep tekking an item until it increases by 10%, especially if the item has Hit.
-- There are no items that temporarily increase EXP gain or drop rates
Rates are static, barring certain events or milestone rewards. There is no need to worry about having to drink boost tickets in order to have realistic drop rates or EXP gain.
-- One person mode exists for soloing
One person mode is the best choice for starting out and learning the game, giving you access to enemies that are easier to defeat in smaller numbers and side story quests that serve as an earlygame tutorial. "Normal" mode is multiplayer mode, and as such, there are more monsters to face which are both more difficult to defeat and are worth more EXP. There is no difference in drop rates between One person and Normal mode.
-- Quests are static content
Enemies will spawn in the same place at the same time. While entering maps normally from Pioneer 2 will give you one of a few map layouts, these layouts will always have the same enemies and puzzles. With experience, you can learn where to go and where enemies will spawn in order to best dispatch them, and you can brace yourself for tricky waves in quests such as Endless Nightmare.
-- Critical hits matter, and are based on the luck stat
Critical hits deal 1.5x the damage that attack would have normally done. The chance of landing a critical hit is based on your luck (LCK) stat. Specifically, it is LCK/4. All characters cap at 100 luck, or a 25% crit chance. You cannot go above 100 luck, no matter what. Finally, Techniques cannot land critical hits.
-- ATP is used for both physical AND ranged damage
Being based off the RPGs of the time, there wasn't an obvious need to split up physical and ranged attack stats. This means if you are playing a Hunter, you should carry at least one gun in case you need to attack from a range. Refusing to carry a gun because "that's not what my class uses" is only hindering yourself, and you will find the game to be unforgivingly frustrating if you make it past level 40.
Similarly, if you are a Ranger, you can be a slightly weaker but more accurate Hunter. Carry some form of melee weapon when you play Episode 4. As for Forces...
-- FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION
I repeat: FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION.
DO NOT make your first character a Force. They are absurdly expensive to maintain early on, and are nearly unsustainable for a new player. Also, because I cannot stress this enough, FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION.
While techniques ignore accuracy and evasion, they tend to do much, much lower damage to compensate. In Ultimate, an enemy that is "weak" to an element will usually take 50% of your base technique damage instead of only taking 20% or 0%. There are exceptions, but this is not the thread for those. For simplicity's sake, the role of a Force is to support the party, and how you do it depends on your choice of Force, be it through the "I am everywhere" support range boosts of the FOmarl or the high accuracy disabling special attacks of the small yappy dog we call the FOnewearl.
Also, no matter what people will tell you, pure melee damage on a FOnewearl is garbage and should never be taken seriously. Cast Shifta and let the HUcast kill things for you, they have three times as much attack as you do.
FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION.
-- You CANNOT change class at will
Once a HUmar, always a HUmar. You can always level another character if you want to play Ranger, but you'll have to make very vigorous use of the common bank. Keep in mind that some classes don't truly begin to shine until well into the 130s, and some classes will just feel a little too underwhelming for you - in that case I'd suggest trying a different member of the class or just an entirely different class entirely.
-- Class/race matters. A lot
Your chosen class/race determines your technique levels (or if you can even use techniques), your maximum stats, and how many materials you can use to boost your stats. In general, males will have higher ATP while females will have higher MST. I don't want to make HP/DFP/ATA generalizations because they're honestly all over the place in each class.
HUMAN
Balanced stats, jack-of-all-trades characters. Can use 250 Materials, and thus are really easy to make max stat plans for.
NEWMAN
Stats that lean more towards MST than ATP, generally high evasion and low HP. Can only use 150 materials, however, so max stat builds can be a logical nightmare. When standing still they can passively regen TP - this regeneration improves with levels but is never really anything super special.
CAST
Entirely trades their MST stat for way, way higher physical stats. They are also immune to the effects of poison/paralysis, and can place traps instead of techniques. In Ultimate, traps detonate on their own significantly faster and have much wider range - do not dismiss them as useless due to how bad they are in earlier difficulties. Similar to Newmans, they have passive HP regeneration when standing still, and can only eat 150 materials, but without a MST stat they're easier to work with.
Finally, many weapons have race-based and sex-based restrictions on who can equip them. For instance, Madam's Parasol is locked to only female characters. Despite partisans being considered a Hunter weapon, neither a HUcast nor a HUmar can equip it, while a FOmarl and a FOnewearl can equip it.
-- Your movement is EXTREMELY limited
This game is clunky and the controls can feel stiff at times. If you are playing on a keyboard, pressing A or D alone will rotate your character before you begin walking, causing it to feel like you're controlling a tank. You cannot jump and there are no quick dodge rolls or blocking motions, so surviving is all about learning what combos you can safely make, and how to position yourself to take out or disable as many enemies as possible.
-- There are no Just Attacks nor Photon Arts You also cannot endlessly slap an enemy around
You have normal, heavy, and special attacks, and you must time your inputs correctly or you will simply drop your combo. Furthermore, your combo is limited to three hits before it ends and you must begin a new attack chain. While you can wildly swing your Saber around in Forest and get away with it, if you do not learn how to time combos then you will die a horrible, horrible death in Caves and Ruins.
Normal attacks are fast and accurate, and serve as the baseline for damage dealt.
Heavy attacks take a moment to wind up and have less accuracy, but do significantly more damage.
Special attacks have the same windup as heavy attacks, but with exceptions, are much more inaccurate in exchange for doing unique effects, such as paralyzing enemies or doing damage to yourself in order to do more damage to the enemy.
You can drop a combo early, and this is vital to keeping enemies in stunlock with weapons such as Swords and Sabers. If you cannot kill an enemy with the third hit of your combo when using such weapons, cancel your combo and step back to engage the enemy again.
Different sexes have different attack animations. Some classes also have unique animations (HUcaseal double saber and FOmarl slicer being the more notable examples) that makes them extremely potent users of their specific weapon types.
-- The game does not truly begin until Ultimate
While PSO2 Ultimate is an absolute shitshow meta shift, PSOBB Ultimate is just the next difficulty level. However, since you will spend the majority of a character's playtime in this difficulty, you should take time to learn basic gameplay mechanics before trying to powerlevel to Ultimate to play with other players. In general, this is how the difficulty levels play out:
Normal: Learning the game, getting a hang of the controls. Enemies are slow and easy to move around
Hard: Applying what you've learned against enemies that are slightly more aggressive, but manageable
Very Hard: Mastering chaining combos and stunlocking enemies against enemies that are very aggressive
Ultimate: Taking all your knowledge and mastering it. Enemies reach their peak aggression and some enemies learn new tricks or inflict different statuses. You cannot outrun enemies, only outwit them
-- Regardless of difficulty, enemies are always aggressive
If an enemy reaches you and you do not have it in stunlock, it will attack you. It will not dance around you, it will not sidestep you - with a few exceptions such as Sinows jumping back to buff or Moths flying to fly to a better angle, they will attack you. If you are overwhelmed by the amount of enemies in a spawn, you can run to the previous room and enemies will not follow you through it - if you use a gun, you can "door snipe" enemies you have difficulty fighting.
-- Closing notes
Actual game experience matters more than experience points. Please, practice the game before you try to power level - as much as people here can tend to be jackasses, there are still a lot of people here who are excited to see new people enter our relatively stale community and will be happy to help out newer players get adjusted.
Finally, this game is fifteen years old. The meta is almost entirely set in stone at this point, and there is a very clear endgame to work towards due to the fact that no new weapons or armors will ever be introduced to this server. While you can do some quirky things with certain items, they are very likely to remain nothing more than quirky things. Before you waste time and energy trying these things out as a new player...
You will not be a viable "spellsword" by eating a bunch of Mind Materials on a HUmar/HUnewearl and trying to do damage with both techniques and melee weapons;
You will not be a viable tank by eating 100 Defense Materials on your RAcast;
You will not consistently evade block things by eating 150 Evade Materials on a HUcaseal or RAmarl past Caves;
You will never outdamage a HUcast as a HUmar
Finally, if you played these certain classes, these are likely what you'll want to try out in BB. Keep in mind that they may require a lot of investment:
Basically every S-ATK class: Hunter
FO/TE: RAcast (I'm not joking), RAmar for self sustain, Newman Forces in one-person mode
TE/HU guard: FOmarl
TE/HU fury, TE/BR: FOmar
TE/RA: RAmarl
GU/anything: HUcaseal if you want to get up close, any Ranger otherwise
Dual Blade BO: HUcaseal
I'm not saying this game is bad by any means. It's still a wonderful experience, don't get me wrong. However, PSO2 and PSOBB have a lot of core differences in gameplay that simply knowing will make your time starting out much easier.
If you are looking for a guide about specifics on classes or certain enemies, this is not the thread for you. I recommend visiting this thread instead for now - this is entirely for the people coming in from PSO2 so they know what they're getting into.
-- Your attacks can miss due to accuracy and evasion
You have an accuracy stat in this game. If you decide to shout "YOLO" and blindly charge into an enemy spamming Heavy attacks to make it die faster, you will only see a red MISS pop up and your character will soon hit the floor. However, Techniques ignore accuracy and evasion, instead scaling off elemental resistances. I'll talk more about combos and techniques later, though.
-- Meseta is relatively worthless, Photon Drops (PDs) are extremely valuable
Meseta is not used to purchase ANYTHING from other players that has actual value. Instead, it is mostly just used to fuel the Charge special. Anything of value is usually measured in PD value.
PDs are rare drops that can drop from anything and everything, and are very likely to be among the first rares you find. Hold onto these - your first purchase should either be a Mag or a Heavenly/Battle in order to make your attacks not slow as molasses.
-- Shifta is extremely, EXTREMELY good
All buffs and debuffs are, really. Shifta can make you clear spawns twice as fast. Even at level 15 from the RAmar, Shifta adds a lot of damage, so if you're the only player in a group with access to Shifta, then cast it on yourself and your allies to drastically improve your performance. Similarly, if you're the only player with Zalure, cast it on enemies as well. Combined with Shifta, enemies will die much, much faster than they would have without the debuff.
-- All items that you have to tek can have their percentages increased by 10%
All weapons that have to be tekked can have their percentages modified in the following manners:
-10%
-5%
No change
+5%
+10%
Non-rare weapons with specials (???? Saber) can also have their level of special attack increase or decrease as well, so non-rares can be a nightmare to get perfect stats on. Charge, Spirit, and Berserk do not have multiple levels, however.
In general, you want to keep tekking an item until it increases by 10%, especially if the item has Hit.
-- There are no items that temporarily increase EXP gain or drop rates
Rates are static, barring certain events or milestone rewards. There is no need to worry about having to drink boost tickets in order to have realistic drop rates or EXP gain.
-- One person mode exists for soloing
One person mode is the best choice for starting out and learning the game, giving you access to enemies that are easier to defeat in smaller numbers and side story quests that serve as an earlygame tutorial. "Normal" mode is multiplayer mode, and as such, there are more monsters to face which are both more difficult to defeat and are worth more EXP. There is no difference in drop rates between One person and Normal mode.
-- Quests are static content
Enemies will spawn in the same place at the same time. While entering maps normally from Pioneer 2 will give you one of a few map layouts, these layouts will always have the same enemies and puzzles. With experience, you can learn where to go and where enemies will spawn in order to best dispatch them, and you can brace yourself for tricky waves in quests such as Endless Nightmare.
-- Critical hits matter, and are based on the luck stat
Critical hits deal 1.5x the damage that attack would have normally done. The chance of landing a critical hit is based on your luck (LCK) stat. Specifically, it is LCK/4. All characters cap at 100 luck, or a 25% crit chance. You cannot go above 100 luck, no matter what. Finally, Techniques cannot land critical hits.
-- ATP is used for both physical AND ranged damage
Being based off the RPGs of the time, there wasn't an obvious need to split up physical and ranged attack stats. This means if you are playing a Hunter, you should carry at least one gun in case you need to attack from a range. Refusing to carry a gun because "that's not what my class uses" is only hindering yourself, and you will find the game to be unforgivingly frustrating if you make it past level 40.
Similarly, if you are a Ranger, you can be a slightly weaker but more accurate Hunter. Carry some form of melee weapon when you play Episode 4. As for Forces...
-- FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION
I repeat: FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION.
DO NOT make your first character a Force. They are absurdly expensive to maintain early on, and are nearly unsustainable for a new player. Also, because I cannot stress this enough, FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION.
While techniques ignore accuracy and evasion, they tend to do much, much lower damage to compensate. In Ultimate, an enemy that is "weak" to an element will usually take 50% of your base technique damage instead of only taking 20% or 0%. There are exceptions, but this is not the thread for those. For simplicity's sake, the role of a Force is to support the party, and how you do it depends on your choice of Force, be it through the "I am everywhere" support range boosts of the FOmarl or the high accuracy disabling special attacks of the small yappy dog we call the FOnewearl.
Also, no matter what people will tell you, pure melee damage on a FOnewearl is garbage and should never be taken seriously. Cast Shifta and let the HUcast kill things for you, they have three times as much attack as you do.
FORCES ARE NOT UNGODLY TURRETS OF DESTRUCTION.
-- You CANNOT change class at will
Once a HUmar, always a HUmar. You can always level another character if you want to play Ranger, but you'll have to make very vigorous use of the common bank. Keep in mind that some classes don't truly begin to shine until well into the 130s, and some classes will just feel a little too underwhelming for you - in that case I'd suggest trying a different member of the class or just an entirely different class entirely.
-- Class/race matters. A lot
Your chosen class/race determines your technique levels (or if you can even use techniques), your maximum stats, and how many materials you can use to boost your stats. In general, males will have higher ATP while females will have higher MST. I don't want to make HP/DFP/ATA generalizations because they're honestly all over the place in each class.
HUMAN
Balanced stats, jack-of-all-trades characters. Can use 250 Materials, and thus are really easy to make max stat plans for.
NEWMAN
Stats that lean more towards MST than ATP, generally high evasion and low HP. Can only use 150 materials, however, so max stat builds can be a logical nightmare. When standing still they can passively regen TP - this regeneration improves with levels but is never really anything super special.
CAST
Entirely trades their MST stat for way, way higher physical stats. They are also immune to the effects of poison/paralysis, and can place traps instead of techniques. In Ultimate, traps detonate on their own significantly faster and have much wider range - do not dismiss them as useless due to how bad they are in earlier difficulties. Similar to Newmans, they have passive HP regeneration when standing still, and can only eat 150 materials, but without a MST stat they're easier to work with.
Finally, many weapons have race-based and sex-based restrictions on who can equip them. For instance, Madam's Parasol is locked to only female characters. Despite partisans being considered a Hunter weapon, neither a HUcast nor a HUmar can equip it, while a FOmarl and a FOnewearl can equip it.
-- Your movement is EXTREMELY limited
This game is clunky and the controls can feel stiff at times. If you are playing on a keyboard, pressing A or D alone will rotate your character before you begin walking, causing it to feel like you're controlling a tank. You cannot jump and there are no quick dodge rolls or blocking motions, so surviving is all about learning what combos you can safely make, and how to position yourself to take out or disable as many enemies as possible.
-- There are no Just Attacks nor Photon Arts You also cannot endlessly slap an enemy around
You have normal, heavy, and special attacks, and you must time your inputs correctly or you will simply drop your combo. Furthermore, your combo is limited to three hits before it ends and you must begin a new attack chain. While you can wildly swing your Saber around in Forest and get away with it, if you do not learn how to time combos then you will die a horrible, horrible death in Caves and Ruins.
Normal attacks are fast and accurate, and serve as the baseline for damage dealt.
Heavy attacks take a moment to wind up and have less accuracy, but do significantly more damage.
Special attacks have the same windup as heavy attacks, but with exceptions, are much more inaccurate in exchange for doing unique effects, such as paralyzing enemies or doing damage to yourself in order to do more damage to the enemy.
You can drop a combo early, and this is vital to keeping enemies in stunlock with weapons such as Swords and Sabers. If you cannot kill an enemy with the third hit of your combo when using such weapons, cancel your combo and step back to engage the enemy again.
Different sexes have different attack animations. Some classes also have unique animations (HUcaseal double saber and FOmarl slicer being the more notable examples) that makes them extremely potent users of their specific weapon types.
-- The game does not truly begin until Ultimate
While PSO2 Ultimate is an absolute shitshow meta shift, PSOBB Ultimate is just the next difficulty level. However, since you will spend the majority of a character's playtime in this difficulty, you should take time to learn basic gameplay mechanics before trying to powerlevel to Ultimate to play with other players. In general, this is how the difficulty levels play out:
Normal: Learning the game, getting a hang of the controls. Enemies are slow and easy to move around
Hard: Applying what you've learned against enemies that are slightly more aggressive, but manageable
Very Hard: Mastering chaining combos and stunlocking enemies against enemies that are very aggressive
Ultimate: Taking all your knowledge and mastering it. Enemies reach their peak aggression and some enemies learn new tricks or inflict different statuses. You cannot outrun enemies, only outwit them
-- Regardless of difficulty, enemies are always aggressive
If an enemy reaches you and you do not have it in stunlock, it will attack you. It will not dance around you, it will not sidestep you - with a few exceptions such as Sinows jumping back to buff or Moths flying to fly to a better angle, they will attack you. If you are overwhelmed by the amount of enemies in a spawn, you can run to the previous room and enemies will not follow you through it - if you use a gun, you can "door snipe" enemies you have difficulty fighting.
-- Closing notes
Actual game experience matters more than experience points. Please, practice the game before you try to power level - as much as people here can tend to be jackasses, there are still a lot of people here who are excited to see new people enter our relatively stale community and will be happy to help out newer players get adjusted.
Finally, this game is fifteen years old. The meta is almost entirely set in stone at this point, and there is a very clear endgame to work towards due to the fact that no new weapons or armors will ever be introduced to this server. While you can do some quirky things with certain items, they are very likely to remain nothing more than quirky things. Before you waste time and energy trying these things out as a new player...
You will not be a viable "spellsword" by eating a bunch of Mind Materials on a HUmar/HUnewearl and trying to do damage with both techniques and melee weapons;
You will not be a viable tank by eating 100 Defense Materials on your RAcast;
You will not consistently evade block things by eating 150 Evade Materials on a HUcaseal or RAmarl past Caves;
You will never outdamage a HUcast as a HUmar
Finally, if you played these certain classes, these are likely what you'll want to try out in BB. Keep in mind that they may require a lot of investment:
Basically every S-ATK class: Hunter
FO/TE: RAcast (I'm not joking), RAmar for self sustain, Newman Forces in one-person mode
TE/HU guard: FOmarl
TE/HU fury, TE/BR: FOmar
TE/RA: RAmarl
GU/anything: HUcaseal if you want to get up close, any Ranger otherwise
Dual Blade BO: HUcaseal
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