*Side Topic* -Open TECHNIC leveling Discussion-

[Tyreek]

Well, as not to deviate from the original discussion about TECHNIC leveling, I decided to take my post into a newer thread. While we were talking about TECHNIC leveling, an interesting thought occured to me at one time. I made a video on my first buff leveling experience a year ago on Youtube. Now someone took it upon themself to say that buff leveling is a cheap tatic for lazy people. Now honestly, I think it was seriously absurd, as this method of leveling buffs is literally ideal for everyone. But what are your thoughts as to buff leveling in general? Is it cheap? Is it efficient? Is the guy a freaking idiot? Share your thoughts.

[JAFO22000]

Well, as not to deviate from the original discussion about TECHNIC leveling, I decided to take my post into a newer thread. While we were talking about TECHNIC leveling, an interesting thought occured to me at one time. I made a video on my first buff leveling experience a year ago on Youtube. Now someone took it upon themself to say that buff leveling is a cheap tatic for lazy people. Now honestly, I think it was seriously absurd, as this method of leveling buffs is literally ideal for everyone. But what are your thoughts as to buff leveling in general? Is it cheap? Is it efficient? Is the guy a freaking idiot? Share your thoughts.


I don't think it's a "cheap tactic for lazy people", but I never participated in "buff parties" partly because I feel that they are an unnatural way to level your techs. Plus, I play games for fun and buff parties are the direct opposite of fun. Same as AFK leveling. But I am not against anyone who wants to do this.

Keep in mind that leveling certain things in this fashion usually leads to one not understanding the tech, bullet, PA as well as someone who levels them "naturally". For instance, someone who sat in PO with a rubber band around their controller shooting Barta at a group of Vahras with a king did not go through the same hardships leveling this tech as I did. But, by doing so, I shot Barta at low levels to the high levels, experimenting with it on different types of creatures and really learning how the tech works as opposed to just having it leveled high. I suppose you can draw an analogy about heart surgery: Would you rather have a heart surgeon who took a quick, year long correspondence class on the procedure or a doctor who spent 8+ years in college studying medical procedures?

I know of people who joined buff parties to get their techs to the max level, then never buffed anyone; they just liked how it looked in their pallet. The only point of leveling the tech was to show off to others.

[Tyreek]

An interesting view. As opposed to using actual attack techs, I saw buff leveling as a productive method to make them stronger. To be honest, I see little coming out of using one buff, waiting for 5-10 mins after a while and then using it again. LOL I actually did that offline with Shifta. By the time I beat the game, it was only level 5. >>;

[redroses]

My point of view is that Buff should be looked at different.
When I was in my Buff Party I was sitting there the whole time smashing my button. It's basically not different from a Techer, Gunner or Fighter to go solo in a mission and only spam/button smash one Photon Art.
Leveling buffs normally would take waaay to much time. And buffs are only useful when there are high levels. Also buffs work different than other photon arts, because leveling the normally also means hoping there isn't a other player with higher buffs in the party and always debuffing his buffs. With other photon arts you don't get other people really in the way, if you understand what I mean. And unlike buffs you can atleast do something helpful even with low leveled photon arts.

Also there is nothing more annyoing for party members to wait every minute so you can rebuff them again, plus the buffs being weak and barely helping. Leveling buffs normally wouldn't be helpful to the player, to the party and cause conflicts and just would take too much time until you could be really helpful with them.

Also @ JAF
I totally agree with you when you say people don't learn how to use a photon art for example if they spam level it on one spot. But like mentioned above, you should look at Buffs differently. You don't need to really aim buffs or use them in a fighting way like Techs (knowing how fast they shot so you can learn to aim, dodge and feel the length or range). Buffs are a circle and all you have to do is be close to everybody, you can learn that in a couple runs. It's also much easier for the player if he has high leved buffs as the circle will be bigger and people will be more likely to wait to be buffed. But with level 1-21 buffs people will barely wait for you to buff them and just keep running away. So again, with buffs you also have to take the team members more into consideration. I am totally on your side when it comes to afk leveling a Tech/leveling a Tech in a safespot except for very low level players, because you just won't get the real feel for the TECHNIC.

[HiroChicken]

Since I just switched to Acrotecher, I decided to join a buff party to get my 4 stat buffs to at least 21. In the time I did that, I just browsed the internet. I agree that buffs should be viewed differently than other techs or afk leveling.

[biggabertha]

I've been up in arms about this subject too.

On one hand, if you level PAs naturally, doesn't that mean the casual player who wants to be able to hit enemies consistently is forced to wear Cati / Hit and the highest grade Tenora weapon available to them for the extra ATA?

Sure, for Casts, this isn't such a problem but when you square off against Deljabans or high level enemies.. having at least Lv. 31+ PAs are kinda essential for those. Otherwise you could be getting batted around and one-hit-killed just because your PA didn't hit or you ran out of PP casting the same TECHNIC over and over again.

Buffs are nicer the higher level they are. I'm sure leveling buffs naturally with other low level players getting through the game at a nice and easy pace is fine. You can get away with that in full parties but small parties or solo... it's not so easy.

If it took me a constant 6 hours and 47 minutes of Rescuing Hyuga A part 1 to raise Rising Shot from Lv. 1 to Lv. 31 a a Gunmaster in order to be helpful against Deljabans, how is the casual player meant to do the same? (It's 8 hours and 26 minutes for a Fortegunner to get Frozen Shot from Lv. 1 to Lv. 31 by the way - I did both on a PS2).

Same thing with buffs - I spent nearly four straight hours as my Acrotecher to level up Jellen from Lv. 1 to Lv. 40. Chances are, I only need to spend about half an hour to get it to Lv. 41 but that's still quite a lot of normal game time considering you're running and not always hitting six targets.


I understand about the learning the PA while you play - I stuck by a Protranser all of my PSU life on the same character. Before we got our first event (Winter event..? The one that gave us Formal clothes), I had gotten all six elemental Shotgun PAs to Lv. 30 without power leveling them and it wasn't until I actually got them to about Lv. 35 did I see any decent damage from them. Or accuracy for that matter - but that's different with TECHNICs since they never miss (so long as they hit physically...).

I assure you, I use my PAs to the best of my ability and even though I have all 56 useable PAs a Protranser can use to Lv. 30/Lv. 40, I only keep the most useful 36 PAs on me while banking the others. (So no, I don't carry Masei-Sou 40 with me... -_-;; )

[darkante]

I see no reason not to use a faster method on leveling techniques if you want too.
Especially buffs, who are you trying to prove?
There is no "skills" involved, it´s just time consuming.

[JAFO22000]

I can understand how different it must be for those in PUGs. I am lucky enough to have a group of friends to play with who did not care if I leveled my buffs naturally; they did not expect me to have all level 30 the day they came out...and it really didn't take that long to do it naturally!

Some things I gained on buffs/debuffs by doing it that were knowing the duration time (almost down to the second!) understanding how to buff up people mid battle and how to properly use debuffs (which creatures to use which debuff(s) on) etc...

It's really hard to explain here, but I did it my way and I'm happy and others did it their way and are happy.

In the end, if you REALLY leveled your buffs to be the greatest help to your party, why didn't you just switch to beast FF or Cast FG?!?!?!

[biggabertha]

In the end, if you REALLY leveled your buffs to be the greatest help to your party, why didn't you just switch to beast FF or Cast FG?!?!?!

Mainly because I cannot STAND the look of beasts or casts in this game. Some look good, yeah - but those lines that casts and caseals have on their faces? Eugh...

Those noses and ears that beasts have? As well as the lips? Sorry, not for me.


But I suppose that just makes me a really subjective person. I can't even stand newmen ears and how Legolas-ey guys look or how child-like females look.


Being a Techer on a PS2's not easy. Please don't try to persuade the few enthusiastic techers to leave what they like to do in a party.

[Tsavo]

Buff parties can be torture. Leveling them only through use in missions sounds like hell on earth to me. I've never really understood the controversy over power leveling skills, bullets, and techs though. Being a subscription based game I always saw the leveling of PA's as part of the grind that we all have to put up with, one more way to keep paying customers coming back month after month. Being a full time student and working 30+ hours a week it always seemed to me the "natural" thing to do would be to cut down on that time spent grinding as much as possible so I can enjoy the game running the missions I want. While I've played with those who have suffered negatively from this, being unaware of how to use their capped skills to their full potential, I always saw such players as those who didn't need to be playing this game in the first place. This game is not hard. While experience definitely helps it always seemed more a matter of brains more than anything to me. Are you getting your ass handed to you by a Deljaban that combos you with critical hits, jumping back and forth and spamming megid while all your attacks register zeros due to its ridiculous evasion score? Probably shouldn't use an axe then. Espicially a 32% dark one with level 4 Anga Redda. And don't cry when no one wants to bring you back after your 13th incapacitation. Really. wtf. But I digress.

Short answer: no I don't see anything wrong with buff parties. Lazy people is lazy. What they choose to do with their buffs has nothing to do with you.

[Alnet]

I think buff parties are absolute hell, but I can tolerate them not because of how strong it makes the buffs, but because it makes them easier to use.

So many times that even while in groups full of people I play with often, people don't want to come in within the range of the S/D/Z/R. If I have the highest level I can, then the less hassle it is for me to chase people down and snap at them for not standing still so I can help them. And the higher my buffs are, the more people are going to want to stay close when I use them.

Basically, I just do it to avoid arguments, because I do get a bit pissed off when people ignore me while I buff them. People tend to have more fun when they're not infighting over something this trivial.

[darkante]

Having low level buffs is not something to be bothered with either.
The small range indicates that i can just pop a Megistride and be on my way.

As i see it, the bigger the circle, the more i care for buffs. XD

[DarkEliteRico]

Just spent just under 3 hours getting my buffs from 20-31, and giresta from 16-41 in order to be more useful as an acrotecher. Once I get my buffs to 41 I'm pretty much set for nothing but grinding and leveling in order to do full on support for higher level parties.
I'll participate in more buff parties when available, since they don't take skill to level just time I don't see anything wrong with them as well considering you don't get experience for tagging buffs on your party like you do with debuffs so why not get them up as high as you can.
Higher buffs just increase things for your team, giresta and restas range and restore rate can also save peoples asses if you play back line support and yet again don't earn you exp for tagging.

Once my buffs are 41 I'm showing a few of my friends some great places where they can level techs fairly fast...well at least 1-30 within a few hours for each element. My acro/fortetecher is my 3rd alt and why wouldn't I want her to be fairly well set in what I feel is her fallback job.

[Dallasdaddi]

It Took Me 15 Hours To Get My Nosdiga And Ramegid From Lv 5 To Lv 31 ! ;( I Think That Players Should Be Able To Buy Lv 50 Technics For A Kinda High Price Like 20.000 For Lv 50 Foie And 35.000 For Lv 50 Megid Cause It Has Unique Visuals

[Whit]

It Took Me 15 Hours To Get My Nosdiga And Ramegid From Lv 5 To Lv 31 ! ;( I Think That Players Should Be Able To Buy Lv 50 Technics For A Kinda High Price Like 20.000 For Lv 50 Foie And 35.000 For Lv 50 Megid Cause It Has Unique Visuals

But where would the fun be in that?

[desturel]

But where would the fun be in that?

It would be fun for me. Since I've leveled up two sets of techs so far, I could clear out space by selling stuff like Megiverse that no one else wants to level. ;)

[Dragwind]

But where would the fun be in that?

For the tons of PAs I've capped and leveled, I rarely ever found them fun to level. I'd prefer a much faster leveling system (such as in PS:P) or to just automatically have a PA at it's full stat (PSZ).

I wouldn't mind buying them either. Out of my 8k hours of play I'm sure more than 1k of those hours was just PA leveling. Not fun.

[Dallasdaddi]

Well what i mean is that you could buy technics at lv 1 & 12 & 21 & 31 & 50 And i think their is no fun in technic leveling unless your extremly lucky at technic leveling which im not -.- and i hate Olgohmons they heal as soon as they have low health its very anoying 5 ramegids then they heal it takes 15 ramegids then they are out with no health

[Whit]

Well what i mean is that you could buy technics at lv 1 & 12 & 21 & 31 & 50 And i think their is no fun in technic leveling unless your extremly lucky at technic leveling which im not -.- and i hate Olgohmons they heal as soon as they have low health its very anoying 5 ramegids then they heal it takes 15 ramegids then they are out with no health

Try leveling your TECHNIC's at Seed Express or Sleeping Warriors. They're pretty much the best place to level any tech.

I was able to get Razonde from 1 to 35 in a 5 hour period just by doing Seed Express.

[desturel]

Well what i mean is that you could buy technics at lv 1 & 12 & 21 & 31 & 50 And i think their is no fun in technic leveling unless your extremly lucky at technic leveling which im not -.- and i hate Olgohmons they heal as soon as they have low health its very anoying 5 ramegids then they heal it takes 15 ramegids then they are out with no health

"Lucky at technic leveling"? What the heck is that. There's no luck involved. You either level the stuff or you don't.

As for Olgohmon, those are tech resistant enemies. Unlike other classes which are overpowered enough that resistant enemies don't matter, tech resistant enemies actually affect how you are suppose to fight against them. No just attack and no multi-hit makes it so you can't just blaze a trail wherever you want. If you are annoyed with how long they take to kill with a level 21 ramegid, you'll continue to be disappointed with how long they take to kill with a level 50 ramegid.

If you are soloing as a techer your choices are to:
1) use a different weapon (cards, longbow, saber, handgun etc)
or
2) If you are a masterforce, do a different run that doesn't have tech resistant enemies, or at least where they don't dominate certain map layouts.

[Dallasdaddi]

I meant Photon Fortune ^___^ . So Whats the best dark technic exept megid :-: ? And whats the best nos technic Nosdiga or Noszonde or Nosmegid i think there should be a Nosbarta that involves flying homing ice pieces that would be a useful technic :) call me stupid if you want to .. but i level technics because i just love the way they do damage like 1200 damage with a lv 50 diga its fun and i love to spam lv 50 technics N___N especially with Dark against Light and Earth against Lightning ect....

[Darki]

I don't think it's a "cheap tactic for lazy people", but I never participated in "buff parties" partly because I feel that they are an unnatural way to level your techs. Plus, I play games for fun and buff parties are the direct opposite of fun. Same as AFK leveling. But I am not against anyone who wants to do this.

Keep in mind that leveling certain things in this fashion usually leads to one not understanding the tech, bullet, PA as well as someone who levels them "naturally". For instance, someone who sat in PO with a rubber band around their controller shooting Barta at a group of Vahras with a king did not go through the same hardships leveling this tech as I did. But, by doing so, I shot Barta at low levels to the high levels, experimenting with it on different types of creatures and really learning how the tech works as opposed to just having it leveled high. I suppose you can draw an analogy about heart surgery: Would you rather have a heart surgeon who took a quick, year long correspondence class on the procedure or a doctor who spent 8+ years in college studying medical procedures?

I know of people who joined buff parties to get their techs to the max level, then never buffed anyone; they just liked how it looked in their pallet. The only point of leveling the tech was to show off to others.

I'm sorry to dissagree with this post... You say that your "understanding" for the use of your "natural levelling", for Dambarta is better than mine after my power levelled Dambarta (bassically. No flame intended).

Why so?

Why can't I achieve a good understanding of a skill usage of a high-levelled TECH by simply using it at that level from the beggining? You have spent 20 levels (in some cases, more, depending on how they change after lvl 31 and 41), that's a shitload of hours of gameplay, using a PA that will be no more the same till it's last 10 levels, while I'd have spent that much time practicing, learning and knowing perfectly how it works at the desired level.

Of course, power levelling PA users seem more nobbish, but are you sure of that? If I've spent 20 hours levelling a set of, for example, 3 techs, think that my gameplay will be the same as if you had use that skill for 20 hours. I can achieve perfectly as good skills as you, the thing is that after those only 20 hours of use I'll see you doing a crap use of a level 3 Dambarta and think "go on, newbie, you can do it" while you'll see me doing crap with level 31 Dambarta and think "lolol that n00b". if you put both of us after 8000+ hours of gameplay using that PA, I bet that understanding of it will be quite well in any case.

Apart from that, I see AFK levelling kind of stupid in some cases, because it's even slower than normal gameplay. I've levelled all my Gi-techs, for example, doing normal A runs in Fight for Food, Mad Beasts or Scarred Planet with a bunch of high grinded Pitocs. The thing is just to have enemies strong enough to hold some hits and to use them at the least damage output, but weak enough to not to be struggling to survive while levelling them. Having monsters weak enough that they don't blowback you is usually nice for skill levelling. Maybe you won't get THAT good skills that if you were trying to Nosdiga a pair of Orgdus, but you can do that later.

I guess for people with a good connection and a lot of busy time is better, as you said, to leave the controller with a rubber band is good enough, but I prefer just to run missions with a full set of low weapons, use all the PP from them and restart or refill them out of the mission. I've levelled all my techs in less than 12 hours each doing that.

[Dallasdaddi]

I'm sorry to dissagree with this post... You say that your "understanding" for the use of your "natural levelling", for Dambarta is better than mine after my power levelled Dambarta (bassically. No flame intended).

Why so?

Why can't I achieve a good understanding of a skill usage of a high-levelled TECH by simply using it at that level from the beggining? You have spent 20 levels (in some cases, more, depending on how they change after lvl 31 and 41), that's a shitload of hours of gameplay, using a PA that will be no more the same till it's last 10 levels, while I'd have spent that much time practicing, learning and knowing perfectly how it works at the desired level.

Of course, power levelling PA users seem more nobbish, but are you sure of that? If I've spent 20 hours levelling a set of, for example, 3 techs, think that my gameplay will be the same as if you had use that skill for 20 hours. I can achieve perfectly as good skills as you, the thing is that after those only 20 hours of use I'll see you doing a crap use of a level 3 Dambarta and think "go on, newbie, you can do it" while you'll see me doing crap with level 31 Dambarta and think "lolol that n00b". if you put both of us after 8000+ hours of gameplay using that PA, I bet that understanding of it will be quite well in any case.

Apart from that, I see AFK levelling kind of stupid in some cases, because it's even slower than normal gameplay. I've levelled all my Gi-techs, for example, doing normal A runs in Fight for Food, Mad Beasts or Scarred Planet with a bunch of high grinded Pitocs. The thing is just to have enemies strong enough to hold some hits and to use them at the least damage output, but weak enough to not to be struggling to survive while levelling them. Having monsters weak enough that they don't blowback you is usually nice for skill levelling. Maybe you won't get THAT good skills that if you were trying to Nosdiga a pair of Orgdus, but you can do that later.

I guess for people with a good connection and a lot of busy time is better, as you said, to leave the controller with a rubber band is good enough, but I prefer just to run missions with a full set of low weapons, use all the PP from them and restart or refill them out of the mission. I've levelled all my techs in less than 12 hours each doing that.

I agree with darki to a sertain degree i think where you have a Atribute opposite like level megid up in white beast or the holy ground and diga in desert goliath you level up better. :-D

[Darki]

I levelled Megid, Barta & Zonde in Sleeping Warriors. it's the best place so far to do it, find the correct map setup and you're done.

[Dallasdaddi]

I levelled Megid, Barta & Zonde in Sleeping Warriors. it's the best place so far to do it, find the correct map setup and you're done.

Thanks Darki my megid is on lv 15 now its my perfect technic im gonna try to level it up to 41+ then il level up zonde then foie and then barta and then all the other technics i havent said :D

[Darki]

Foie and Diga level by themselves, almost. I'd say to level these techs the easiest way is just spam Plains Overlord S2 (or even S3 if you're in JP, I guess) and go for the safe spots in that map, I'm sure you'll get them high in not many runs. For the other three, I'd stick with Sleeping Warriors, in the one that starts with the big room block. Just kill the initial monsters and use the walls to block the rest.

[milranduil]

"Lucky at technic leveling"? What the heck is that. There's no luck involved. You either level the stuff or you don't.

As for Olgohmon, those are tech resistant enemies. Unlike other classes which are overpowered enough that resistant enemies don't matter, tech resistant enemies actually affect how you are suppose to fight against them. No just attack and no multi-hit makes it so you can't just blaze a trail wherever you want. If you are annoyed with how long they take to kill with a level 21 ramegid, you'll continue to be disappointed with how long they take to kill with a level 50 ramegid.

If you are soloing as a techer your choices are to:
1) use a different weapon (cards, longbow, saber, handgun etc)
or
2) If you are a masterforce, do a different run that doesn't have tech resistant enemies, or at least where they don't dominate certain map layouts.

This changes with supplemental update. That's all I'm saying :P

[SolomonGrundy]

"Same thing with buffs - I spent nearly four straight hours as my Acrotecher to level up Jellen from Lv. 1 to Lv. 40. Chances are, I only need to spend about half an hour to get it to Lv. 41 but that's still quite a lot of normal game time considering you're running and not always hitting six targets."

This is exactly it. There is no skill involved in buffing (exept knowing which buffs are needed the most in the case where you are only casting some of them). I happily participated in buff parties, and I am glad I did. Even when I ran with a full party (rare), You cast's buffs once ever 2-3 mins? Think about how long this would take when you consider castiing shift 1/second for 4 hours gets your to 41.


"In the end, if you REALLY leveled your buffs to be the greatest help to your party, why didn't you just switch to beast FF or Cast FG?!?!?!"

a. That's inflamatory
b. Not overone wants to play a FF/FiG
c. I dare say thta level 50 buffs + Level 50 debuffs (+ Giresta!) makes eveyone's life easier than having another FF/FiG

[Max B]

"Same thing with buffs - I spent nearly four straight hours as my Acrotecher to level up Jellen from Lv. 1 to Lv. 40. Chances are, I only need to spend about half an hour to get it to Lv. 41 but that's still quite a lot of normal game time considering you're running and not always hitting six targets."

This is exactly it. There is no skill involved in buffing (exept knowing which buffs are needed the most in the case where you are only casting some of them). I happily participated in buff parties, and I am glad I did. Even when I ran with a full party (rare), You cast's buffs once ever 2-3 mins? Think about how long this would take when you consider castiing shift 1/second for 4 hours gets your to 41.


"In the end, if you REALLY leveled your buffs to be the greatest help to your party, why didn't you just switch to beast FF or Cast FG?!?!?!"

a. That's inflamatory
b. Not overone wants to play a FF/FiG
c. I dare say thta level 50 buffs + Level 50 debuffs (+ Giresta!) makes eveyone's life easier than having another FF/FiG
Acrotecher with resta > a shity fortefighter