Some more questions (mostly braver related)

[Achelousaurus]

1) How important is element % on a weapon and is there a better element than light (I won't get weapons several times with different elements)?
Kenei has 30% Dark, is this actually going to reduce my damage vs Darkers?
Either way, can I change the element to light?

2) I've seen some Braver videos before shunka / hatou and it's such a huge difference to my own crappy play style, notably these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEDl-hxpT8E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoA9...6uZa1x&index=2

3) Considering flawed countering, is it still a better idea to spam shunka instead of using weaker pas for lots of airtime to hit weakpoints?

4) How do I shunka without getting hit so much?
My problem is shunka has 4 movements which will sail me straight past the target after the first hit unless I lock-on. But lock-on makes my cam spin madly (as the shunka movement now circles around the target) and always confuses me, so i get hit.

5) Using a gamepad and not being good at manual targeting with analog sticks, is locking on and rpaying target cycle hits the right spots and doesn't take forever the best way?
Cause that's what's happening for me and if I don't lock on, I am even more inaccurate and prone to not even hit the right enemy.

6) Any tips on how to learn to counter?
My timing is very bad and it looks like there is no way around learning ALL enemy&boss attack patterns with the precise required timing for counter.

7) And how can I tell what my ping/ latency is cause I am getting a lot of lag.

8 ) You can counter just by releasing guard, right?
So I could guard when the telegraph attack starts and only release when it does hit?

9) How do I Katana Combat?
I'm only using it as panic button / license to derp / free shunka spam at the moment.
My Finish damage varies great but is often not much higher than 2 shunka hits.
How do I raise to the obscene numbers I see others do?
My own max seems to have been 63,000 but I have no idea how or even when.
I hear Hatou Rindou is great for raising the damage but very hard to use (I don't have it yet) and it also costs 60pp.
Are there other good ways?

10) how do you get absurd damage?
I sometimes see people outdamaging my full shunka with one Kanran Kikyou. My own Kanran does like 10% damage of 1 shunka hit.
I am lvl 55, subbing hunter at 45 and I'm using a +10 Red Katana.
Nothing spectacular but I only got PSO BB stats in my head and there 400ATP was a pretty big difference and all, not even remotely close to this difference in damage.
In PSOBB +2 ATP roughly translated to 1 more damage, but seems like atk raises damage a hell lot more in this game.

[Rien]

1) How important is element % on a weapon and is there a better element than light (I won't get weapons several times with different elements)?
Kenei has 30% Dark, is this actually going to reduce my damage vs Darkers?
Either way, can I change the element to light?

Only the % is important. That % element is added to your attack, but slightly reduced by the target's elemental resistances/weaknesses. You can purchase an Element change (Light) at the myshops, which you then use while element grinding to produce a light elemented katana. However, the Light change is damn expensive.

2) I've seen some Braver videos before shunka / hatou and it's such a huge difference to my own crappy play style, notably these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEDl-hxpT8E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoA9...6uZa1x&index=2

3) Considering flawed countering, is it still a better idea to spam shunka instead of using weaker pas for lots of airtime to hit weakpoints?

This depends entirely on what you're fighting. If it's an airborne enemy like Agnis or Windira, feel free to Shunka. If it's something like say, Rockbear, shunka can still hit the weakspot, but so can Gekka Zakuro's uppercut (which is an instant 11k for me on JA)

4) How do I shunka without getting hit so much?
My problem is shunka has 4 movements which will sail me straight past the target after the first hit unless I lock-on. But lock-on makes my cam spin madly (as the shunka movement now circles around the target) and always confuses me, so i get hit.

Don't forget Shunka has left/right capabilities.

5) Using a gamepad and not being good at manual targeting with analog sticks, is locking on and rpaying target cycle hits the right spots and doesn't take forever the best way?
Cause that's what's happening for me and if I don't lock on, I am even more inaccurate and prone to not even hit the right enemy.

6) Any tips on how to learn to counter?
My timing is very bad and it looks like there is no way around learning ALL enemy&boss attack patterns with the precise required timing for counter.

You don't have to perfectly press the Shift button. There's a one second timeframe, so you're actually able to press early and counter. If not, there's always the guard that doesn't hurt you as bad. Shunka only has a few frames to counter, between each slash, so that's probably what's hurting you.

7) And how can I tell what my ping/ latency is cause I am getting a lot of lag.

Is this framerate lag or actual latency?

8 ) You can counter just by releasing guard, right?
So I could guard when the telegraph attack starts and only release when it does hit?

No. You counter by pressing the Guard button when it's going to hit you and let go when you hear the *ding!*.

9) How do I Katana Combat?
I'm only using it as panic button / license to derp / free shunka spam at the moment.
My Finish damage varies great but is often not much higher than 2 shunka hits.
How do I raise to the obscene numbers I see others do?
My own max seems to have been 63,000 but I have no idea how or even when.
I hear Hatou Rindou is great for raising the damage but very hard to use (I don't have it yet) and it also costs 60pp.
Are there other good ways?

Hatou costs 30 pp each. You'd generally use Hatou for bosses and Kanran Kikyou when surrounded by mobs to build the numbers. Katana combat's finish damage varies by the number of hits you do before finish. It's kind of like a Chain Trigger with an invisible counter that ignores which mob you hit. The maximum damage for Combat Finish is 30 hits, so work around that.

10) how do you get absurd damage?
I sometimes see people outdamaging my full shunka with one Kanran Kikyou. My own Kanran does like 10% damage of 1 shunka hit.
I am lvl 55, subbing hunter at 45 and I'm using a +10 Red Katana.
Nothing spectacular but I only got PSO BB stats in my head and there 400ATP was a pretty big difference and all, not even remotely close to this difference in damage.
In PSOBB +2 ATP roughly translated to 1 more damage, but seems like atk raises damage a hell lot more in this game.

Graduate from a Red Katana. At level 55 you can get a Blue Katana, but I don't recommend that either.

Buy a Lambda Castiron(?? ラムダキャスティロン) in the least. The uh, red/blue katanas act like 1-6* weapons, and there's a difference between minimum damage for 7* and above weapons.

Sorry, I don't use a gamepad so I can't answer related problems.

[isCasted]

1) How important is element % on a weapon and is there a better element than light (I won't get weapons several times with different elements)?
Kenei has 30% Dark, is this actually going to reduce my damage vs Darkers?
Either way, can I change the element to light?

2) I've seen some Braver videos before shunka / hatou and it's such a huge difference to my own crappy play style, notably these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DEDl-hxpT8E
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoA9...6uZa1x&index=2

3) Considering flawed countering, is it still a better idea to spam shunka instead of using weaker pas for lots of airtime to hit weakpoints?

4) How do I shunka without getting hit so much?
My problem is shunka has 4 movements which will sail me straight past the target after the first hit unless I lock-on. But lock-on makes my cam spin madly (as the shunka movement now circles around the target) and always confuses me, so i get hit.

5) Using a gamepad and not being good at manual targeting with analog sticks, is locking on and rpaying target cycle hits the right spots and doesn't take forever the best way?
Cause that's what's happening for me and if I don't lock on, I am even more inaccurate and prone to not even hit the right enemy.

6) Any tips on how to learn to counter?
My timing is very bad and it looks like there is no way around learning ALL enemy&boss attack patterns with the precise required timing for counter.

7) And how can I tell what my ping/ latency is cause I am getting a lot of lag.

8 ) You can counter just by releasing guard, right?
So I could guard when the telegraph attack starts and only release when it does hit?

9) How do I Katana Combat?
I'm only using it as panic button / license to derp / free shunka spam at the moment.
My Finish damage varies great but is often not much higher than 2 shunka hits.
How do I raise to the obscene numbers I see others do?
My own max seems to have been 63,000 but I have no idea how or even when.
I hear Hatou Rindou is great for raising the damage but very hard to use (I don't have it yet) and it also costs 60pp.
Are there other good ways?

10) how do you get absurd damage?
I sometimes see people outdamaging my full shunka with one Kanran Kikyou. My own Kanran does like 10% damage of 1 shunka hit.
I am lvl 55, subbing hunter at 45 and I'm using a +10 Red Katana.
Nothing spectacular but I only got PSO BB stats in my head and there 400ATP was a pretty big difference and all, not even remotely close to this difference in damage.
In PSOBB +2 ATP roughly translated to 1 more damage, but seems like atk raises damage a hell lot more in this game.

1) Going from 30 to 50 element value improves your damage by a lot (not really sure how really, but it's great enough to be important). Elemental value determines damage to any enemy with same difference, no matter the weakness, enemies weak to your weapon's element will take 20% more damage. Also, by most part enemies don't have elemental resistances, only weaknesses (notable exceptions are Elder's dark resist and Snow's ice resist).

2) Many PAs got buffed (Gekka, Asagiri and others), so these videos are outdated.

3-6) Learn to counter, it's the most easy to do with Katana. Most PAs allow you to counter easily, Shunka is not one of those. Get to know when to use Asagiri, Tsukimi->Gekka combo, learn positioning with Hatou.

8 ) No, you need to do it right before hit. Katana Gear is what allows you to start guarding a bit earlier than you are usually supposed to.

9) Combat Finish can do absurd amounts of damage when pulled off right. Damage of finisher depends on two factors: hit count during KC and whether you JA'd finisher or not. Depending on situation you ramp counter up with Kanran (mobbing) or Hatou (bossing). My personal damage records 50-Fire Kenei and build without Fury Up 2 (1967 S-ATK total) are 50-55k on Fire-weak enemy, 105-130k on Fire Darker weak spots, 330k on Falz Arm with Weak Bullet.

10) Well... It depends on what numbers you hit. Red Katana isn't that great weapon, you should get something that at least doesn't have DEX penalty.

[Achelousaurus]

Thanks a lot!
I got some pretty bad advice from my team at first, things like "don't ever use not-shunka or not-hatou" and other crap, so I didn't pay much attention to other pas.
I guess I need to re-evaluate all of them.

Shunka vs airborne? When they fly low it#s feasible but most of the time they are out of shunka range.

My lag seems to be skipping a few frames now and then, I don't think it's cause my pc can't handle the game because it's a good and mostly cause I get massive lobby / menu lag during peak but no lag I notice during off hours.

...I always thought the ding! sound comes after the counter and now the signal to counter now.

And does the damage done raise Combat Finish damage or only the hits?
My Kanran Kikyou does so low damage that if I go for many hits with it, the damage during combat is really low (though for a great finish it would be well worth it).

As for the weapon, I have started Matter Board for Kenei. I intend to finish quickly with the direct route and later go back and check out story scenes I may have missed.

PS, Kenei comes with 30% dark, should I just grind that to 50% or better switch to a different element (even if not light cause it's too expensive)?
And I'd need more 10* Katanas for that or?

[Kikikiki]

Thanks a lot!
I got some pretty bad advice from my team at first, things like "don't ever use not-shunka or not-hatou" and other crap, so I didn't pay much attention to other pas.
I guess I need to re-evaluate all of them.

Shunka vs airborne? When they fly low it#s feasible but most of the time they are out of shunka range.

Shunka is still the PA with highest air reach on the second and third, and even more so on the final strike. It's still your best option for fighting air enemies, just a bit slow.

My lag seems to be skipping a few frames now and then, I don't think it's cause my pc can't handle the game because it's a good and mostly cause I get massive lobby / menu lag during peak but no lag I notice during off hours.

This should be latency issues.

...I always thought the ding! sound comes after the counter and now the signal to counter now.

You can clearly see that the ding! is when the damage is nullified and the character does the short-jump-wave-slash thing. Just a little bit practice and it should feel natural to JG on katana.

Also, even on SH, enemies have fairly clear intentions on when they are going to attack you/their attacks have considerable lag time/some bosses have noticeably similar attack patterns, so just a few observations now and then should be enough.

And does the damage done raise Combat Finish damage or only the hits?
My Kanran Kikyou does so low damage that if I go for many hits with it, the damage during combat is really low (though for a great finish it would be well worth it).

Nope, only the hits count for the Combat Finish damage.

As for the weapon, I have started Matter Board for Kenei. I intend to finish quickly with the direct route and later go back and check out story scenes I may have missed.

PS, Kenei comes with 30% dark, should I just grind that to 50% or better switch to a different element (even if not light cause it's too expensive)?
And I'd need more 10* Katanas for that or?

Kenei is a relatively nice weapon for when you have no access to other 10*s. If you can afford a second one and plan to change element, it's best to just change to fire, since the difference isn't that bad on enemies not weak to fire, and it's a hell lot cheaper last time I checked.

If you can though, Boulay Obs (ビューレイオブス) should be cheap on the market, and is still one of the best 10* katana for running BR/HU.

Just keep the Kenei for when you want to level your HU as a subclass.

[Shiyo]

As has been said, element type barely matters, just get it to 50.

Don't spam shunka and always hit weak points when you can. Only spam shunka if you want to be lazy and kill things slower. If you have problems not taking infinite damage while using shunka, just don't use it. It's not the best PA in every single situation anymore, and it's not meant to be used in situations where it's too risky to use. Learn how to use the other PA's, every single one is useful except the AOE stun(imo).


I lock on with the gamepad, select is lock on and left analog stick changes target.

Practice is the only way to learn to counter, if you're not fighting stuff solo enemies lag HORRIBLY and you'll basically never be able to counter. This is especially true for rockbear, who is basically a complete gamble on whether or not you'll counter him with someone else hosting because his punches don't come out for like 10s after the animation.


Lock onto weak point or part you want to break(quarts tail vol tail etc), then attack to it so you fly into range and spam asagiri/hien or auto's with just attacks to build up charges, then once it has 2-3 seconds left just attack and finish it.

You need a better weapon to do more damage, simple as that. Red/blue/crafted weapons are very weak because they don't get the DEX bonus thing. I also find my kanran doesn't hit very hard, and I'm using a 1005 sattk 11 star. Kanran is only good vs super weak enemies on SH imo, I prefer single target damage killing them but that's just me.

Shunka vs airborne? When they fly low it#s feasible but most of the time they are out of shunka range.

Asagiri and shunka are both fantastic vs flying enemies if you lock on, makes them easy to take care of. Flying enemies are super annoying for melee usually.

Never listen to anyone who tells you to only spam Shunka and Hatou, they have no idea what they're talking about. Learn how to use every single PA except the AOE stun, all have uses for maximizing DPS and kill speed.

Number of hits, not damage, is what helps katana combat finish damage.

I don't think Kenei is that great of a katana for how much time it takes to get. Matter board 16 takes a looong time, you're better off just buying a random 10 star that's already grinded off a shop for like 500k-1m.

[TehCubey]

Regarding kanran kikyou damage:

Megidolaon, you are charging the technique, right? It will deal pathetic damage if you just tap the PA button, you need to hold it until the charge is done.

I don't think Kenei is that great of a katana for how much time it takes to get. Matter board 16 takes a looong time, you're better off just buying a random 10 star that's already grinded off a shop for like 500k-1m.

On the other hand, some people have no access to premium but do all matter boards as they are released. That makes Ken Ei easier to get for them, though the "grind your way through the sea of ringhadas" aspect is still there. Ken Ei is also allclass, which means you can use it as hu/br (better base stats, especially HP).

[Achelousaurus]

Thanks again.
I guess I should charge Kanran but the uber damage I saw was with uncharged.
Kenei I want particularly because it's all class and I hear HU has much better stats than BR (my BR is 55, HU 45).

And yeah, in multi I sometimes lag horribly, just now a full second delay between getting hit and actually taking damage.
Yesterday there was a 5 second delay between feeding my mag and seeing the animation.

My current Hunter tree
My current braver tree
Braver has a number of screw ups cause of horrible advice from my team, like "go raise dex, it's great" or "you should max braver mag".

[KuroKanden]

that, and you also get access to Kenei earlier on your HU due to its low S-ATK req (600 S ATK) , compared to Susano (420 T DEF ; thats around lv 60 ). so you'll have a much easier time lving your HU.

HU/BR has slightly higher HP and abit more S-ATK than BR/HU. but by the end of the day, they don't differ as much in terms of gameplay now. HU/BR was initially favored for TAs since they do get access to stronger partisan, but now you have trident that covers up that flaw for BR/HU.

for general play, I think you should probably with with BR/HU for the stronger katanas.

[Achelousaurus]

Oh, Alright.
Say, whyever would I use a Partizan over a Katana?

And yeah, considering my BR lvl doesn't rise, HU needs to be lvl 59 for me to equip Susano.
I should probably get a Mercy of Lillipa / Lambda Bigglow for now (I just hope they are not super expensive).

Oh and charged Kanran is nice damage for me.

Also, my lag is pretty sick. When in an MPA it can be 2 full seconds, for example it can be 2 seconds until I know if I dodged the Doritos beam successfully or not.
Is there even a point in trying to counter in big MPA quests?