i have a few questions about this game. bear in mind i've never played a person or shin megami tensei before. i'm playing as the boy
1. how do you get more ability cards and how do you use them up?
2. is it better to use lots of different personas or should i just stick to morpheus?
3. which s-links give you the best personas?
4. is a persona just like a summon out of FF8? (equip him and he gives you certain abilities)
5. how often should I go to the evil world to fight monsters and how many floors should i do? (i'm on floor 11 right now)
6. Which extracurricular activities should i stick to? i read that the shrines were supposed to be shit but i already used one to double my ability cards
7. what's the point of buying food? is it like going for a piss in that it makes your condition go from good to great? if so what are the advantages of using it?
So I'm actually playing FES, but I imagine this probably still applies to P3P as well.
Playing this game is a constant battle between my desire to move things along and my desire to play the game optimally. Cause if I was playing optimally I'd ensure that my entire party was tired before calling it a day in Tartarus. At this point in the game however
I just beat the Tank full moon boss
that takes seemingly fooorrrreeeevvveeer. So I usually punch out once I've either reached a new waypoint teleport thing or the top of the current block.
The fact that I'm easily rolling all the full moon bosses isn't really encouraging me to grind much either.
I'm on Normal mode, is there ever going to be some crazy difficulty spike where I will regret not grinding more, or can I just continue on my pattern of: Get to highest accessible point in Tartarus -> Social Link till full moon?
Generally, the full moon bosses are tuned easier than the highest reachable Tartarus bosses to help prevent players from getting stuck in Tartarus the night before.
Some of the later Tartarus bosses absolutely will give you a hard time, but if you can reach the highest point, you will be absolutely fine for the Full Moon bosses.
Overall, P3/FES normal mode are some of the easiest SMT games.
Sipowicz said:
i have a few questions about this game. bear in mind i've never played a person or shin megami tensei before. i'm playing as the boy
1. how do you get more ability cards and how do you use them up?
You get through many means. Doing well on tests, completing the missing person requests from the Police, ordering them on TV, or buying them from the Rare Item store. You can use them as you would any item out of your inventory, then you select a Persona to give that skill to.
Duplicating cards at the shrine is awesome.
2. is it better to use lots of different personas or should i just stick to morpheus?
Irrelevant. Most of the ultimates are pretty good, but the non S. Link personas and the ones you earn from the mandatory story-related S. Links are good enough that you'll be fine.
4. is a persona just like a summon out of FF8? (equip him and he gives you certain abilities)
Skills, weaknesses/strengths, combat level, and combat stats are based on your equipped Persona. You can change your persona in battle as well to adjust to the enemies you're fighting, as well.
5. how often should I go to the evil world to fight monsters and how many floors should i do? (i'm on floor 11 right now)
There's a floor cap (barrier) for each month. Just try to reach it before each full moon.
The fewer trips you make into Tartarus, the more time you will have to raise social stats and night S. Links. However, as the male character it isn't much of an issue, so taking 1 trip or 8 trips a month shouldn't make a difference.
The female main character has 3x as many nighttime S. Links, which makes her night phases far more valuable.
6. Which extracurricular activities should i stick to? i read that the shrines were supposed to be shit but i already used one to double my ability cards
It doesn't matter. Don't spend phases building your social stats (charm, academic, or courage) if it is at all possible to do an S. Link.
The Shrine info is a bit out of date. Now that you can spend time there to earn points with any S. Link you want, or can copy skill cards without using a phase, it is really goddamn useful.
7. what's the point of buying food? is it like going for a piss in that it makes your condition go from good to great? if so what are the advantages of using it?
Some food are healing items. Some food are for S. Links. Some have other uses. Generally, buy one of each "cheap" food item or drink from vending machines. It will make things a lot easier if you encounter a person that wants a specific item.
i have a few questions about this game. bear in mind i've never played a person or shin megami tensei before. i'm playing as the boy
1. how do you get more ability cards and how do you use them up?
2. is it better to use lots of different personas or should i just stick to morpheus?
3. which s-links give you the best personas?
4. is a persona just like a summon out of FF8? (equip him and he gives you certain abilities)
5. how often should I go to the evil world to fight monsters and how many floors should i do? (i'm on floor 11 right now)
6. Which extracurricular activities should i stick to? i read that the shrines were supposed to be shit but i already used one to double my ability cards
7. what's the point of buying food? is it like going for a piss in that it makes your condition go from good to great? if so what are the advantages of using it?
2. Orpheus will become redundant very soon, just fuse stuff and use your strongest Personas.
3. Just do whatever S.Links you want, you won't be able to use the final Persona of the S.Link till much later in the game anyways.
4. No, its kind of like you are the Persona.
5. Just clear each block before the next full moon and you'll be good to go.
7. I think you need some of the food for Elizabeth's quests.
Level >>> more important than stats in the combat algorithms. Each point into Magic or Strength is only a few % difference in spell strength, and there really isn't THAT much variance in stats between Persona of equal levels. On the other hand, I think each Lvl increases damage dealt by somewhere between 5 and 10%, and reducing damage by roughly the same factor, and increasing hit, and increasing dodge, and reducing your changes to be crit, etc.
You can have a level 29 Persona who does much more damage from magic attacks than a level 34 Persona with the same spell, so picking which Persona to use just by levels is not a good idea.
In the ER their Gdon was level 34 but only had a Magic Stat of 11 during this battle.
thank you for all your help guys, especially you yawee. I'll try and maximise all the s-links I have so far. I'll also get as far as possible in the evil world. I've got jujst over a week left until the full moonso i should be cool
I am currently level 7 and I have the strongest weapons from the police station, so i should be ok anyway.
I have three personas right now. Orpheus, Pixie and Asparas. do you reccomend fusing them together? will it matter that my s-links are quite low as i can get better s-links over the next few days
and how can i get more personas? the only way i know of is the cards that drop after each battle and fusuion
thank you for all your help guys, especially you yawee. I'll try and maximise all the s-links I have so far. I'll also get as far as possible in the evil world. I've got jujst over a week left so i should be cool
I am currently level 7 and I have the strongest weapons from the police station, so i should be ok anyway.
I have three personas right now. Orpheus, Pixie and Asparas. do you reccomend fusing them together? will it matter that my s-links are quite low? i can get better s-links over the next few days
and how can i get more personas? the only way i know of is the cards that drop after each battle
i noticed that it doesn't work sometimes. what do you do in those cases to make yourself great?
The persona system kind of confuses me. Should I just merge them randomly and hope I get something cool?
Also, I noticed my main guy has 3 personas and my other characters have 1. The people with 1 level up faster. I think their personas are level 8 and my main character is level 5. Should I destroy or merge the extra 2 to level up faster?
The persona system kind of confuses me. Should I just merge them randomly and hope I get something cool?
Also, I noticed my main guy has 3 personas and my other characters have 1. The people with 1 level up faster. I think their personas are level 8 and my main character is level 5. Should I destroy or merge the extra 2 to level up faster?
When fusing you should check all your options and find something that will be useful to you based its abilities and elemental strengths and weaknesses. You should never do it "randomly" since you always know what you are going to get from whatever you are fusing.
Only the Persona you have equipped when a battle ends gets the experience from the battle. Since everyone else has only 1, they'll level up faster than the mix match of Personas you are using. Your characters level should stay about even with your team's Persona levels.
It takes a long time to level up a Persona, so it is generally better to fuse them into something higher level, because the bonus XP from social links is going to level them up way faster than they ever will in battle.
The persona system kind of confuses me. Should I just merge them randomly and hope I get something cool?
Also, I noticed my main guy has 3 personas and my other characters have 1. The people with 1 level up faster. I think their personas are level 8 and my main character is level 5. Should I destroy or merge the extra 2 to level up faster?
Only your active Persona gets exp at the end of the battle, except for Persona with the Growth passive skill (the exp they get while being in stock is "free", in that it is just a bonus).
Exp per level for our MC's personas are a bit strange. Level for level, personas take more exp to gain a level than your MC does, so they gradually fall behind your MC's level, encouraging you to fuse newer, higher level personas regularly.
Your teammates' personas are basically the teammates level, which should stay equal to your MC's level, not the level of your MC's persona.
So how's the game treating all of you veterans of P3 and P3:FES? I've been thinking about picking this up again just to kill some time at night, but are the changes added in P3P really worth paying full price or should I just wait until it goes down to like $30 or less?
15 Hours in I am amazed at all the spoken lines of dialogue. This is my first play through since the original Persona 3. I started it this weekend and its awesome just watching TV while grinding through the Tartarus in the background or while relaxing on the deck. Pretty soon I think I will have to look into getting a larger battery.
The persona system kind of confuses me. Should I just merge them randomly and hope I get something cool?
Also, I noticed my main guy has 3 personas and my other characters have 1. The people with 1 level up faster. I think their personas are level 8 and my main character is level 5. Should I destroy or merge the extra 2 to level up faster?
Experimenting with Persona fusion is one of the main parts of the game. Save at the clock in the Tartarus lobby go into the Velvel Room and mess around. Don't worry about doing it "right" just try stuff, see what you get and if things don't pan out you can always reload. Keys to look for are what weaknesses your Persona have, what Skills they allow you to use in combat, whether they're stats will help your weapon attack (Strength) or their magic attack (Magic), how well you take damage (Endurance), if you have a better chance to crit (Luck), your chance to evade (Agility) etc. You should carry as many Persona as you can: to cover any kind of weakness against attacks you may come across, to be able to exploit enemy weaknesses and also to have buff/debuff/status ailment/healing utility.
Not sure how you're getting behind in levels. Character level happens independent of Personas
Yaweee in general I agree that the s.link ultimate Persona aren't something necessary in themselves but someone doing weapon fusion might be interested in them (The Tower one for Yukari's best bow for instance)
My Name Is Luke said:
So how's the game treating all of you veterans of P3 and P3:FES? I've been thinking about picking this up again just to kill some time at night, but are the changes added in P3P really worth paying full price or should I just wait until it goes down to like $30 or less?
I'm enjoying the MCShe playthrough. A few things they've imported from P4 I could do without but it's definately fun and new enough to make things compelling. Not sure if you'd personally find it worth full price but I have no regrets on my purchase
on another note, how do social links work? i was under the impression that the higher the soical line the better your new personas of that arcana. but do your existing personas improve alongside the social link as well?
as an example, if i have a fool persona will it get more powerful as i level up the fool social link?
Yaweee said:
Do become great, you can spend a day phase at a store in the mall. Not worth it.
on another note, how do social links work? i was under the impression that the higher the soical line the better your new personas of that arcana. but do your existing personas improve alongside the social link as well?
as an example, if i have a fool persona will it get more powerful as i level up the fool social link?
so i should avoid becoming great if it's too muh trouble?
Yeah, Great isn't really necessary or worth the phase you have to waste to get the bonus.
Once fused, Persona don't get anything from further S. Link development. The S. Link bonus is just a huge EXP bonus given the moment that a fusion is complete, often resulting in numerous level gains and new skills. Even without maxing ANY social links, you'd have access to 150 of the game's 170 Personas. The only personas that the S. Links unlock are the ultimates, which are the highest level persona of each arcana.
It will all make sense as you get a few months in to the game.
My Name Is Luke said:
So how's the game treating all of you veterans of P3 and P3:FES? I've been thinking about picking this up again just to kill some time at night, but are the changes added in P3P really worth paying full price or should I just wait until it goes down to like $30 or less?
I'm absolutely loving it so far. Finished the fifth full moon event, less than 27.5 hours on the clock. So far it seems like it will easily be my favorite of the Persona games.
Compared to the original releases (playing as MShe):
- Much faster and smoother gameplay
- Better pacing, resulting from the drastic reduction in time between major story events.
- Shorter load times
- Greatly improved gameplay mechanics, including party control and spell cards
- Increased difficulty. Maniacs is definitely harder than P3/4's Hard Modes, which still felt too easy.
- Better music. The only track that I like worse than the MC's equivalent is the town music. Most are better than before, some are washes.
- Better S. Links. The only new one that feels worse is Hermit, but Strength, Magician, Moon, Justice, Chariot, and Priestess (Fuuka starts a cooking club) are more enjoyable than the male equivalents.
- Nice changes to required scenes and dialogue options.
- Better spread of S. Links. In FES, and especially in P3, you ran out of shit to do at night way too soon. MShe has 6 night S. Links, more Koro walk sequences, and I think more points necessary to rank up with each character. The entire S. Link system is a more enjoyable game than it was before.
Spoil it for me guys, have they changed anything in the end-game or the ending in general or is it still the same from FES ? (minus the epilogue i-e The Answer of course).
I'm about 4 hours in and I already have to do a full PSP charge.
THIS is my major issue:
it's on PSP.
Just kidding (?)
Loadings are very short but I don't like how some times you have to wait a few seconds to let the game load the voice.
I think this affects only voices when you are in battle, since the game has to load lots of other things, too.
For example before Mitsuru says "It looks like it has multiple weaknesses", etc.
But with the game installed when you hit an enemy the battle starts in about 1.5 second, unlike P3 FES... I appreciate that.
I was worried about losing my early game persona to Fusion, but someone said I could get them back after I register them, like Persona 4. Are they catalogued in the background so I can fuse away, or am I waiting for Igor to unlock a compendium type thing? I'm on the second block at this point.
Anyone know what the best method is to raise academics/courage? Someone mentioned earlier in the thread that the arcade is the best - but I'm not so sure.
Anyone know what the best method is to raise academics/courage? Someone mentioned earlier in the thread that the arcade is the best - but I'm not so sure.
Four more as the game progresses. By the halfway point you should have three more. Which is perfect, as that is when the social stats start capping out.
alright. i've gotten up to the highest level in the tartarus. i've completed all of elizabeth's quest. so i wont be messing about with that nonsense any time soon. no full moon for a week
i've also discovered the home shopping network. they'll have some rare cards next week so i'm going to save up to buy them
i am currently in "golden week" which is a 3 day holiday. but i've got midterm exams afterwards. are you supposed to do anything to prepare for midterms or can you just piss about with social links?
also when do you get the compendium that lets you buy personas?
The Arcade greatly increases the stats, whereas working only increases it, though, and it's not like you get a lot of money from working. You're also pretty much free during the nights until Summer, so until then it's better to go to the Arcade.
i am currently in "golden week" which is a 3 day holiday. but i've got midterm exams afterwards. are you supposed to do anything to prepare for midterms or can you just piss about with social links?
also when do you get the compendium that lets you buy personas?
You should boost your Academics so you can get the highest score on the test. You'll get the Compendium when you go to the Velvet Room after the first full moon event.
You should boost your Academics so you can get the highest score on the test. You'll get the Compendium when you go to the Velvet Room after the first full moon event.
The test has multiple choice questions for you to answer, based on the lectures you've heard throughout the previous months.
The higher your score (a function of the questions you answer and your Academic stat) will net you better rewards from Mitsuru. These are mostly cards used in fusion, or skill cards.
You need various levels of social stats to start certain S. Links. You'll get messages when your stat isn't high enough to start one.
The test has multiple choice questions for you to answer, based on the lectures you've heard throughout the previous months.
The higher your score (a function of the questions you answer and your Academic stat) will net you better rewards from Mitsuru. These are mostly cards used in fusion, or skill cards.
You need various levels of social stats to start certain S. Links. You'll get messages when your stat isn't high enough to start one.
Two of the exams just measure how high it is. It used to be enough with 3 points for midterms, then 5 and then 6, but I think they've lowered a bit now since you need more points to level up.
Even if you get all of the multiple choice questions right, unless you are the 3rd Academic rank, you'll only get "in the top 10", and a correspondingly lower reward.
Even if you get all of the multiple choice questions right, unless you are the 3rd Academic rank, you'll only get "in the top 10", and a correspondingly lower reward.
Yep. Wednesdays/Saturdays. Also, studying during the day is much better than the night. Use a few of the days before the exams because school S. Links are disabled.
Also, having finished the game proper, I totally forgot that you needed to do a NG+ to get the "character" endings which is fairly annoying but more importantly, I didn't remember that you really need The Answer to at least explain the fate of the protagonist... they probably should have tossed in a few scenes from The Answer as some kind of bonus epilogue.
Also, having finished the game proper, I totally forgot that you needed to do a NG+ to get the "character" endings which is fairly annoying but more importantly, I didn't remember that you really need The Answer to at least explain the fate of the protagonist... they probably should have tossed in a few scenes from The Answer as some kind of bonus epilogue.
31 hours in, at the Sleeping Table and just a few days before the October Full Moon event. Goddamnit, I remember how hard that fucker was on FES' Hard mode. I can't imagine this being any smoother =(
I'm like 7-8 hours in and just finished the first full moon event.
I did that in P3 FES, too.
But I stopped playing after the second one, so after that it's going to be all-new-content... and if some cutscenes were really good you guys need to tell me, I'll youtube them.
I'm like 7-8 hours in and just finished the first full moon event.
I did that in P3 FES, too.
But I stopped playing after the second one, so after that it's going to be all-new-content... and if some cutscenes were really good you guys need to tell me, I'll youtube them.
I liked the first one with Fuuka in FES.
Oh well, we'll see.
As for the (missing) in-game cutscenes, some are stupid (Akihiko is surrounded by girls, BUT YOU CAN'T SEE THEM!) while others are absolutely fine imho
I still wonder if these are game design choices or some kind of GB limits.
I liked the first one with Fuuka in FES.
Oh well, we'll see.
As for the (missing) in-game cutscenes, some are stupid (Akihiko is surrounded by girls, BUT YOU CAN'T SEE THEM!) while others are absolutely fine imho
I still wonder if these are game design choices or some kind of GB limits.
Didn't someone determine that FES takes up something like 2.5 gigs on a DVD? I'm sure they could have gotten all that content on the UMD if they wanted to and just further compressed things a la Gitaroo Man Lives. My guess is that it was all design choice so they could do all the Girl's Side stuff on the cheaper.
NichM, you out there? Have any possible insider insight you'd be willing to share?
I liked the first one with Fuuka in FES.
Oh well, we'll see.
As for the (missing) in-game cutscenes, some are stupid (Akihiko is surrounded by girls, BUT YOU CAN'T SEE THEM!) while others are absolutely fine imho
I still wonder if these are game design choices or some kind of GB limits.
Ah, the Fuuka one was pretty good. It doesn't lose as much in the P3P transition as the other ones do.
For the most part, the P3P changes were made for design decisions, as it fixes what I think P3/4's biggest problems were (its pacing), and I think the developer blogs said as much. The lack of animated cutscenes, however, were probably just Atlus being cheap and lazy and not wanted to redraw the MShe into them or fix them for a much different resolution. There's about 400 MB on the UMD empty, if I recall correctly.
Honestly, I'd prefer to see this style used in P5 if Atlus can't bring the old style up to a similar speed, but it needs a lot more work.
It would need:
- More artwork for incidental characters.
- More than 2 characters on screen at a time.
- A more clear indication of what characters are present in each scene. I've often found myself not knowing who was there until they spoke.
- More animated scenes, or cut-away images (like in Phantasy Star 4) to show things that can't be portrayed accurately with just the visual novel style.
Am I the only person who had absolutely no problem with the pacing of P4? Hell, my only problems with P3's pacing have to do with the fact that nothing of any interest happens during the summer months
(and at that point, Ken, Aigis and Koro still totally suck)
The pacing in P3 FES was sloooow, but as stupid as this may sound I think it added to the charm.
At first I thought "what the heck is this game?" but then it grew on me.
Still, the problem is that it was on a home console.
I'm sorry, but I can't turn on the TV and my Ps2 every time I want to play and then have to bear with empty days where I just tap "X" and wait for things to load.
I liked the repetitiveness, but I always thought it was a perfect portable game on a home console.
I also blame my Ps2 setup, not very comfy. P:
edit. And you know what? once I'm done with P3P I'll probably play "The Answer" on FES.
I just got some sweet rare panties that make Yuka-tan pretty naked, and giving Elizabeth a COMPstation got me a two handed sword. It boosted Junpei's attack from 36 to 118 or something. It was a good night.
I just got some sweet rare panties that make Yuka-tan pretty naked, and giving Elizabeth a COMPstation got me a two handed sword. It boosted Junpei's attack from 36 to 118 or something. It was a good night.
