Nioh Slash-All!

So last night I tried going to next area. I still had 4 or 5 sub missions but I just wanted to keep pushing the story. There are still a lot of skills I can't access because I have to complete ? ? ? missions. Thought I might go back for subs later. And I proceeded to get my ass kicked by a bunch of ninjas. One time I cleared one tough enemy but couldn't find a secret door or something. Then I wandered back to an enemy I had ran past and died again. I lost 30k amrita that I started the level with (70 to next level), and then multiple times over about an hour of play I lost smaller amounts repeatedly by not making it back to my spirit. I also wasn't killing enemies with a bow headshot. Tried a couple different bows and nothing worked. The whole thing was not fun at all.

Finally after another death without recovering my spirit, when I had no amrita left to lose, I used that item to abandon mission. Looked at the level of the mission: 70. My level: 65.

I guess I'm going back to do those sub missions. Then maybe my bow will work properly and I won't die so quickly when I get back to this one.

So I took a break, working on some other games.

The remaster released yesterday. I have Nioh 2 PS4 disc so I can get the remaster for free. There's also apparently some fee boon items and such until Feb 26. So I might want to upgrade and start it soon if I'm going to do it.

Do I need to finish Nioh before I try 2? Story spoilers or anything?

Nioh 2 is a prequel and from what I've seen of the early game, there shouldn't be any Nioh 1 spoilerage.

Kinda in a similar boat. As soon as I started seeing remastered collection videos on Youtube, I was thinking about restarting my playthrough and picking up the odachi instead (still not head over heels for the switchglaive). But I am also trying to play other games and Nioh requires so much of my attention/dedication.

Well that's good story-wise. Mechanics-wise it sounds like 2 improves everything and maybe adds some systems. So I feel like once I start 2 I'll never go back to the first. So do I want to try to finish Nioh or just chalk it up to 50+ hours of fun and let it go? Hmm...

Stele wrote:

Well that's good story-wise. Mechanics-wise it sounds like 2 improves everything and maybe adds some systems. So I feel like once I start 2 I'll never go back to the first. So do I want to try to finish Nioh or just chalk it up to 50+ hours of fun and let it go? Hmm...

If you're still having fun, keep playing. If you're not, move on. There are far, far too many games out there during this golden age of gaming to keep playing something you don't like.

I tried the first game again today at lunch. Went back and took down Warrior of the West first try. Haha. Level 27 mission, me at 65. But it felt good after all the failures weeks ago.

The lightning spirit from that mission seems really good too. Might be the only one I've really enjoyed using besides my starting Kato.

Cleared up 2 more old side missions as well. Good work for an hour ish. Only gained 2 levels because old missions but I'm sure that got me closer to trying that main mission that kicked my butt before again. I guess I'll give it another week or two. Not a huge rush on Nioh 2. And either taking a break sharpened my skills or I'm just way over leveled haha. But it was a lot of fun today.

Nice Stele! Nothing like giving a game some space before returning to kick some butt.

If I recall correctly you're playing on PS5? Did you say you were thinking about getting the super-duper remastered collection of both Nioh games?

Yeah I'm on PS5. Nioh 1 already looks pretty great. I have Nioh 2 PS4 disc so get the free upgrade. Not sure I'll buy Nioh 1 remaster. I can't see putting in the time for a second run. If I want to mix it up and try different weapons I'll just do that in Nioh 2 at this point.

Heck I still might respec and try some other weapons now. I finally got into a better groove with the dual swords. They really seem to dominate against human enemies. I can out quick them and drain their stamina with kick, then either grapple or knockdown.

Still switch to spear sometimes for yokai or bigger enemies. The reach is great.

So many of the mission reward weapons have been basic swords though. And it seems like every armor set has a 6th piece that's a sword. So I'm considering trying sword/dual as a respec.

I have a couple from mission rewards and the one from the clan is pretty cheap too. So I could always switch back if it doesn't work.

Or maybe I'll just push through and switch it up for Nioh 2. We'll see.

Well I picked up the Nioh Remastered collection on PS5 and am enjoying it so far. I haven't played either game but am a big fan of the Souls games. So far it feels different enough to get me excited to play it and it actually looks great on PS5. I was just playing Dark Souls 3 on XSX and this is night and day better.

Maclintok wrote:

Nice Stele! Nothing like giving a game some space before returning to kick some butt.

Finished 3 more side missions last night and one more at lunch today. One time I lost 20-30k amrita, but every other one the last two days was a success.

I finally used a summoners candle last night when I had about 70k out there, the furthest I had got into that particular level. Needed 90k to level up and didn't want to blow it. Went ahead and used some amrita items at the time and leveled up before continuing.

So I'm 70+ now. I forget maybe 72. Only one side mission left in the first 3 areas and it's that level 70 yokai boss mission. He one shots me with his jump, backhand, pretty much every attack. So I guess I'm going back to area 4 main mission tonight. Hopefully I'm a bit stronger than I was a couple weeks ago and can break through.

I've totally lost track on what region or missions you're on at this point, Stele. But it sounds like more steady progress and at Level 70 you're fully in it. My memory is bad but I may have been in the low 100s when I finally finished my first playthrough.

1st story mission on the 4th area of Japan was a level 70 that was kicking my butt when I was 65. Think it was called The Iga Escape. Ninja mansion, crazy stuff. Couldn't even do enough damage to headshot enemies with an arrow. It was bad. First post at top of this page actually.

And the side mission from my last post was Greater Demon Hunting, also level 70. I didn't realize but it was Onryoki again, but without the balls and chains this time. Hah. Just beat him again on another side mission yesterday and was pretty easy.

Was trying to push through story because I still have a ton of skills that need me to finish some mission (?) to unlock. Would like to unlock the next round of those dojo missions and get some more abilities. Hopefully tonight, more progress.

EDIT: f*cking Giant Toad. It's not that I can't avoid some attacks. I've got him down under half health twice out of like 10 attempts. The problem is if he hits me it's a one-shot, or it's 90% of my health. Jeez.

At least I finally got through the stupid level. But lost 70-80k amrita one time. Should have used candle. Ugh. I'm 74, the level is 70, but apparently I need better stats or gear so I don't have to be perfect.

Beat giant toad sometime yesterday. Better armor helped me not get one shot but still it was annoying.

That finally unlocked new versions of combat, ninja, and magic at the dojo. I won combat but didn't have the appropriate stat at 15 to even attempt the other 2.

Finished up another sub mission last night too.

Today on to the lilies mission. Level itself was pretty simple. Got a couple more level ups. Ogress boss is tough. I think my problem was trying to dodge her jump attacks and maybe I should just hold in the button and run instead of tapping it to dodge? I'm going to look up some tips now that I've failed about 7 or 8 tries.

I actually got her down to 70% or so and tried to use living weapon. That was interesting. I got her pinned in a corner. And hitting her was restoring my living weapon. I thought I was going to win. But then it ran out. And she spread lilies everywhere, grabbed me, threw me in the air and hit me multiple times. Insane combo that kills me every time.

I even got her below 50% another time with no living weapon and still got destroyed by the insane combo after she spread lilies. Not fun. Maybe I just need to dodge that one move better. We'll see.

Finished Ogress. I had built up spirit weapon again after several failed runs, tried it with her under 50, and ran out and died. Gah. Then 2 or 3 attempts later I beat get without using spirit weapon. Got in a great groove of dodging and sticking to her hip, and avoided that mega grab nonsense.

The next mission was just a scene, so I'm at main mission 12, and I finally looked, there are 18. I'm only level 80ish and the recommended for 18 is 135. So a few sub missions would have to be done in there somewhere. Not sure finishing this in Feb is feasible with the TV time I'm getting.

Perhaps I will start Nioh 2 just to do the upgrade and get those first month boons at least.

Nice work. Yeah Ogress was a toughy for me until I discovered rolling into her - especially when she does the near 90-degree pounce - is the key to survival. Also worked well to stay close to her to avoid her tricky mid- and long range attacks. Stayed in low stance much of the time for all the dodging needed and being so close range.

Well I jumped back in today a bit. Finished sub mission I was stuck on last time I played. Rescued the other blacksmith so that was cool and now there's a lot more perks to unlock there.

Back to main mission after that.

I really do want to play 2 but I am sure I'll never come back to this. So going to give this a little more time and try to push through. I guess the remaster will be there waiting for me.

And finished Defied Castle right after that post last night. On to the next area.

Okatsu boss fight was tough. Especially going back in to gather my spirit. Sometimes she would pounce and I'd be half dead before I could pick it up. One run she actually killed me as I recovered it. Honestly almost beat her the 3rd try, down to about 10% but I used spirit weapon too early. Then it took me a dozen more attempts to get that built back up. I read a tip about using extraction magic and getting your weapon built back up faster on boss retries but it didn't seem to work for me.

So many boss fights in this game? Yeah, I needed a Google to jog my memory.

Sorry I don't remember doing anything special. It was a real dance and test of wills. Eventually I just guzzled enough elixirs to get me through to victory!

Finished Immortal Flame tonight. Whole level on fire. Blew 100k amrita early on when I couldn't find a shortcut door. And also didn't realize you could use bombs to blow up walls for shortcuts. Ugh. Mission level 96 and I'm still 86 or so.

But the boss, with a bird spirit, he went down on the 3rd attempt. Most annoying thing was when he jumped up to fly it broke lock on. But pretty easy fight. Didn't even use spirit weapon because I had burned it on a yokai before and didn't get it recharged that quick.

Looks like I finally unlocked some weapon challenges at the dojo for dual swords and spear. Also I got achievement earlier today for max dual sword proficiency. 500k for the dojo mission but it shows me maxed out at 999,999. Fun.

Holy sh*t that's a giant skeleton.

Working my way up to the boss attempt. Got all the crystals triggered but then died to a yokai near the 3rd one. Will try it for real later hopefully.

The mission before that was crazy. All out war going on and dodging cannon shells and crazy shooting everywhere. I got agro from 3 or 4 enemies at once a few times. It was wild. I didn't find all the kodama but I did manage to not lose any amrita and always make it back to my spirit. Gained a few levels too.

I also went back and did that other Onryoki sub mission, Greater Demon Hunting. Since it was 70 and I was 90-something I finally finished it. He couldn't quite one shot me anymore. I would still have 100 health or so if I was full, so it was close. But that was enough to get through it in a couple tries.

Pretty productive for a day off while the kids were napping.

Finally got some run this weekend. Got through Defiled Holy Mountain, Samurai from Sawayama main missions. Got the magic 20 and ninja 20 final missions to get mystic arts. Had to respec to get them high enough, so I dabbled in some katana skills to try it out. Did a side mission with that, but it was a struggle. I'm so used to dual swords and spear. I think I'll save the weapon experimentation for NG+ (if ever) or more likely Nioh 2. I got about 80k in sword mastery, and was thinking about that 500k dojo mission. But it's not worth grinding out more weapons like that just for mystic arts, not when I'm this close to the end.

Finished a few other side missions too, just trying to level up a bit. Think I'm around 110 now. Just 2 story missions left from what I can tell. But it's rated at 135 I think. Need to do a couple more side missions maybe. Maybe soul match my weapons for some upgrade? I dunno.

I did finally get a dual sword armor set last week, Master Swordsman, and a nice dual blade to go with it. But it being heavy armor, I couldn't wear the full set. I did manage to get 3 pieces plus the blade for a 4-part bonus. And then this weekend I finally got Justice Minister, another dual blades armor set. So I've got 4 and 2 going right now, with some good bonuses.

I might go ahead and try the final mission and see. I have a few of those branches if I need to escape and go grind on side missions. I did level up 5 or 6 times during the last story mission though. Just plugging away, and being very careful on run backs, using those extra life scrolls just in case. Popped a few summoner's candles and a couple of the item to go back to shrine after running down my spirit with enough to level up. Had one mistake where I forgot to use a scroll and blew about 120k. But it's taking like 5-600k to level up right now so that didn't cost me too much. So maybe I'll just grind through the last mission. I really want to finish this since I've made it so close.

And credits! Whew.

Final mission was fun mostly. The repeat bosses were cool, especially since you could go back to shrine and tweak your magic for each one. The level design was wild and visually impressive. Had a couple pathing bugs with my NPC teammates that sucked. They got stuck and suddenly I was fighting 2v3 when I thought it was 3v3 or something a couple times. The two final human bosses up the elevator I both beat on my 2nd try. Dual swords just dominates humanoids. The hydra took a few more... maybe 5 attempts. I did read some tips after the 2nd or 3rd try because sometimes they were stunned and sometimes not, and was trying to figure out the trigger for that.

Interesting ending, with the lying hehe.

Now I guess there's an epilogue after these credits? Yeah maybe I can do one more mission...

Congrats Stele! Let us know how the epilogue goes and whether you plan on a NG+.

Maclintok wrote:

Congrats Stele! Let us know how the epilogue goes and whether you plan on a NG+.

Just finished it as you were posting that probably. Ended up level 119.

Tower of London looks a lot different than it did dozens of game hours ago. Pretty easy final boss, only 2 attempts. But the sub bosses to get the key took 3 or 4 tries. I kept trying to pull one at a time and getting overwhelmed. Finally said screw it and popped spirit weapon and got through it.

Lot of cool stuff after that. NG+ mode opens. Can carry a second spirit and switch between them. And can now level up spirits too! I just can't see grinding through again when I have other games to play though. Even Nioh 2.

I might finish the last 3 sub missions I see for that finish all missions trophy. Plus I just want to try out having 2 spirits for a bit. But yeah no NG+ and no trying for platinum.

Plus it seems like the servers got shut down. The last 2 or 3 weeks I haven't been able to see any clan stuff. No way for me to get any points there for the alternate skins and stuff. I'm not sure if you can play online either, but I haven't tried it. And I saw there's a trophy for 10 co-op missions. So yeah, moving on very soon.

But I beat it! Pretty challenging gaming achievement. I'm not too old for this sh*t, haha.

Stele wrote:

And credits! Whew.

Congrats Stele!

So I picked this up on sale on PC and spontaneously decided to give it a go Sunday night. I'm at the boss of the first mission and it's the first time I'm really having trouble (well, him and the surprisingly fast Yokai in the burning village, between the path that was on fire until you dump a water bucket on it).

I feel like I'm missing something. I was able to whittle down the purple bar until it was empty, and then when I tried to hit him with a strong attack like you execute on humans, nothing happened. Just a standard attack. There's got to be a purpose to dragging down that purple bar. What's different about the Yokai? You can see my most successful run here, but after that one failed I just gave up mentally.

I've loved everything I've played so far. It's got that faster, more aggressive style of play that I prefer from Bloodborne, but stamina is incredibly important and I like that switching gears up from other action games. But this giant dude is just... so padded with health, and while I can whittle down that purple bar, I dunno if there's really any purpose to it.

I think the stun happens when you chop off his horns. You did it at 2:20:45 in that video of your best run.

He really is a pain in the ass that first time. Took forever. 2nd boss you will either win or quit the game. After that it's honestly pretty easy.

There's a Onmyo skill that lets you use your spirit animal attack 3 times. Guardian Spirit Talisman. And you have Kato, his attack is really awesome. Straight forward, easy to hit. It will decimate most yokai enemies and break their horns for stun. But it will take a good chunk out of Onryoki's health. Get it and use it.

Page 28 of this thread has some of the answers you seek, when I played this about 6 months ago. Mac posted a video

Page 27 you can read my struggles over and over with the fishing village just making it to the boss, and beating the little yokai that were around here and there through the level. Seems so silly now. I could just charge a yokai, break the horns, and kick their ass in a few seconds. But back then, man it was a struggle.

And you can see my whole journey from can't beat anything, to OMFG that second boss, to beating the game over the last 3 pages of this thread.

I was going to say, which was the first boss that was supposed to give trouble? The prologue guy?

I wasn't even aware that horn breaking was a thing. Maybe I skimmed some tutorial details because I was playing while streaming (also I was not sober when I first played on Sunday), but I don't recall that being mentioned.

Yeah not London, that's prologue.
I think everyone counts Onryoki as the first boss. That's the one you're fighting on the boat at the end of the village.

The boss on the next story mission is the real tough one that can make you quit the game. Hino-Enma.

Ahh, I see.

I'm actually a bit startled to be reading back and seeing folks had such trouble with the fishing village. I died twice or thrice from the starting shrine to right before the boat, but otherwise did pretty well. Maybe four times? I don't recall. I'd have to rewatch the stream but it wasn't really a lot of deaths. The only one I recall clearly was dropping into the locked room with the Yokai, and I had unlocked the shortcut to the shrine before facing him so it wasn't that big a loss.

I feel like it's the bosses that trip me up with some of these games. Onryoki just feels like way too much of a damage sponge. However, I believe it was Coldstream that mentioned rolling through the boss, so maybe I ought to try that. Just run up into his belly and then roll when he swings. Really though, I think I'm going to just grind back through and start fighting some of the Revenants I wandered past. I mostly left them be, but now I'm thinking I might be able to improve my gear somewhat and earn some currency for leveling up. And hopefully start stocking up on Elixers. I actually had four in storage before my first fight with Onryoki... and then I uh... I never got that fortunate again.