Nioh Slash-All!

I beat the first real boss! I was so excited that I saved the replay, which actually had all four attempts.

In the first attempt I died in 20 seconds. I lasted about 25 seconds the second attempt. In the third attempt I almost lasted 2 minutes, and I died soon after seeing his second form. On the fourth attempt, after about a minute I had used all my healing items, and he was still in his first form. Thirty seconds later, I had pushed him to his second phase, but I was at low health. Dodge and hit, dodge and hit, dodge and hit. I nearly got myself killed when he was at a sliver of health, and I shouted "Don't get greedy!" (which fortunately did not wake my sleeping wife). I managed to finish him off, with the fight lasting 2:40 total. Woot!

Aristophan wrote:

I beat the first real boss! I was so excited that I saved the replay, which actually had all four attempts.

In the first attempt I died in 20 seconds. I lasted about 25 seconds the second attempt. In the third attempt I almost lasted 2 minutes, and I died soon after seeing his second form. On the fourth attempt, after about a minute I had used all my healing items, and he was still in his first form. Thirty seconds later, I had pushed him to his second phase, but I was at low health. Dodge and hit, dodge and hit, dodge and hit. I nearly got myself killed when he was at a sliver of health, and I shouted "Don't get greedy!" (which fortunately did not wake my sleeping wife). I managed to finish him off, with the fight lasting 2:40 total. Woot!

Is that the one on the ship? I am having a heck of a time with him.

SpyNavy wrote:
Aristophan wrote:

I beat the first real boss! I was so excited that I saved the replay, which actually had all four attempts.

In the first attempt I died in 20 seconds. I lasted about 25 seconds the second attempt. In the third attempt I almost lasted 2 minutes, and I died soon after seeing his second form. On the fourth attempt, after about a minute I had used all my healing items, and he was still in his first form. Thirty seconds later, I had pushed him to his second phase, but I was at low health. Dodge and hit, dodge and hit, dodge and hit. I nearly got myself killed when he was at a sliver of health, and I shouted "Don't get greedy!" (which fortunately did not wake my sleeping wife). I managed to finish him off, with the fight lasting 2:40 total. Woot!

Is that the one on the ship? I am having a heck of a time with him.

Yes. I spent a lot of my time circling around him, and then would run in for a few hits. I'm playing with the Kusarigama (mid stance), which attacks pretty quickly. I think the first phase was much harder, due to him swinging stuff around, which was a lot easier to avoid on the second phase.

Be aware, the game appears to only save at shrines and on the mission select screen. I had made my way from a shrine and picked up my Guardian Sprit and then quit. When I started the game back up again, I was back a the shine and I had to retrieve it again.

Glad to hear that I'm not the only one getting my arse handed to me by that boss. I've tried five times and only made it to the second phase once. Clearly my skills at dodging and ki burst are not up to snuff. I just can't seem to find enough time to get in, hit, and get out without those damned circle swinging attacks hitting me.

I picked up a sweet purple kusarigama that replaced my beloved blue dual-swords, but it seems too slow to let me get the strikes I need. Mid-stance seems to be a good spot for my play style, but I'm open to other options.

Just practice, practice, practice, I guess.

Also, some of the revenants are real Female Doggoes. I've beaten all of them, but I wonder if it really reflects the play-style of the player.

Protip: if you die at the same time as a big Yokai, it will not respawn.

As for revenants, I have fought of few, and they were all pretty much tough fights. Since I don't know what Glory does, I don't see much point in fighting them. Some do give some good hints for the area.

I'm picking my way through the early parts of the alpha/beta zone now. I am taking my time with things, trying to make the Ki pulse stuff part of my muscle memory but it's hard!

Dual swords and Kusarigama for me although I haven't touched a single foe with the sickle yet. The dual sword low stance is wonderful for feeling out encounters (aka waiting for the enemy to make the first move) then a switch to mid to really dig in on guys when they are low on stamina and health.

Playing in Action mode because we all want a high, steady frame rate, right? Anyone playing on the Pro and using Cinema?

For some reason spoiler tags aren't working so I guess I'll wait and post the rest later. I finally made it to the second area after a brutal but optional boss fight. This game certainly has Team Ninja levels of brutality and is giving me flashbacks to Ninja Gaiden Black.

Coldstream wrote:

Glad to hear that I'm not the only one getting my arse handed to me by that boss. I've tried five times and only made it to the second phase once. Clearly my skills at dodging and ki burst are not up to snuff. I just can't seem to find enough time to get in, hit, and get out without those damned circle swinging attacks hitting me.

I picked up a sweet purple kusarigama that replaced my beloved blue dual-swords, but it seems too slow to let me get the strikes I need. Mid-stance seems to be a good spot for my play style, but I'm open to other options.

Just practice, practice, practice, I guess.

Also, some of the revenants are real Female Doggoes. I've beaten all of them, but I wonder if it really reflects the play-style of the player.

High Stance with light attack once does decent damage and you can dodge out of the way.

Cool, spoiler tags seem to be working again.

Spoiler:

Okay the samurai lord you fight during the sub mission near the end of the first area is by far the hardest enemy I've faced. He is extremely fast, has a dashing sword move that literally takes out most of my life bar in one hit, has combos that smash through my guard and leave me stunned, endlessly rolls and dodges even when his Ki is depleted, and summons his guardian spirit that slows me down with lightning when hit. All of this at over ten levels above the recommended level! It took a quite awhile for me to get the timing and direction of my dodges down. The dashing sword move was an absolute killer until I finally realized I needed to charge towards him and dodge through him at the last second to avoid it. Once I got that down the fight was much easier. Everything in the first area is now done save for twilight missions. Also finished the silver mines and was not a fan of all the poison, boss at the end wasn't too difficult though. After that samurai fight it was almost simple by comparison.

Are yellows better than blues? Or other way around?

Purple > Blue > Yellow > White.

Thanks Mr. Crinkle.

Anyways, where did the last 3 hours just go? This is definitely scratching that Souls itch. Definitely quicker paced and I think less punishing even though I still died numerous times. What weapon types have you guys been using? Been enjoying using the spear.

Balthezor wrote:

Thanks Mr. Crinkle.

Anyways, where did the last 3 hours just go? This is definitely scratching that Souls itch. Definitely quicker paced and I think less punishing even though I still died numerous times. What weapon types have you guys been using? Been enjoying using the spear.

Light armor + dual swords + sickle and chain + onmyo magic
Definitely a fast, jump in and out build. Can't take many hits.

Light armor & the kusarigami, with some poison jutsu and devigorate talismans for tougher fights . I have a spear equipped as well but I've only used it a handful of times, nothing else compares to how fun the kusarigami is to use.

The third boss Hino-Enma took me many many attempts to beat. After learning all the attacks, I was finally successful when I got into a rhythm of attack, attack, dodge back, which didn't overcommit myself and kept me out of harm's way.

Afterwards, I dipped into random multiplayer. I got matched into a game pretty quickly, and I helped someone run through the first section of the caves. I could pick up items and I earned enough Amrita (about 3k) to level up. I would have earned more Amrita, but if the host dies, you only earn half. He died soon after the second shrine. I guess praying at the shine does not dismiss your companion, and the only way to get full credit was if we had beaten the boss. Overall, playing two payer feels very overpowered. I can see why they dropped unlimited cooperation.

@ruhk
sh*t... are you me?

Aristophan wrote:

Overall, playing two payer feels very overpowered. I can see why they dropped unlimited cooperation.

I'm not sure what you mean by unlimited cooperation. The FROM games typically featured some sort of barrier or requirement in order to summon. Either you had to be "human" (which typically required consumption of some item), or have an actual item to consume (insight or the cups in Nioh).

But I agree that co-op can be over powered. There doesn't seem to be any level matching going on, so I, as a level 65+ player, went back and offered my help for the Hino-Enma fight and was being matched with people obviously attempting it for the first time (so level ~15). With no level adjustment for the boss, I ripped through her, and every enemy on the way to her, with no problem.

The problem is that co-oping bosses is the easiest way to build a certain currency, if you want to get involved in that aspect of the game. So there was little incentive for me to pick a harder/more leveled boss, since the rewards would be nearly the same regardless.

In coop, you can only have someone join you who has completed that mission. So if you want your friend to help you, they must have defeated the boss. You can't go through the game purely cooperatively, like Diablo. That's all I meant about the limitations in co-op.

I helped someone beat the Hino-Enma soon after beating it myself. Even though I wasn't overpowered, not having her focus on me the whole time made the fight much easier.

What an intense moment. After exploring for awhile, I am left with 1/16 of health left and no elixirs. I ponder for awhile if I should use the item to teleport me back to the shrine or risk killing a mob for an elixir. Killed one mob, chased by 2, poisoned by 1 and was lucky enough to run up a ladder and use an antidote (because I am an idiot, I did not put it in a shortcut and had to go through the items menu to use it) with literally a sliver of health. Good thing too, because the item that activates the shortcut was right there.

Intense!

I'm heading to bed after I change my boxers.

I've been very impressed by the level design. I was concerned when I heard that the game was split up into levels, instead of an interconnected world. To my delight, the levels have contained many avenues of exploration and recursive loops. When you run through a level in a side mission, it has been tweaked to provide new challenge in a familiar area.

I also like the game design of powerful enemies that do not respawn. It gives another feeling of progression if you take one down, even if you end up dying.

As with other Souls games, the thing like least is the boss battles. I have felt myself getting better at each fight, but they can be slog to get through. I recently beat a big old lightening dog, which took me a while. It turned out that there was much more to explore after that fight. I wonder if you summon someone for that fight if they have to continue or if they can leave. At least it was a short run each time I did it.

In the process of beating that boss, I spent some ninja points and got the Quick-Change scroll, which resurrects you from a fatal blow. It has literally saved my life more than once. I'm now committed to going full ninja on this game.

The Kusarigama is indeed a very fun and (so far) effective weapon. I started with the dual swords - fun little weapons in their own right - but I don't know if I want to go back to those all that often anymore!

My attribute points distribution has gotten all whack. Mistakenly put points into Stamina thinking it affected Ki. Dumped too many points into Skills. Already a bit of a mess. Is there a way to respec?

Maclintok wrote:

Is there a way to respec?

The blacksmith sells a respec book.

Finally! I discovered the technique that rendered that stupid first boss (ball-and-chain boss) fairly trivial.

Spoiler:

Turns out you can dodge straight ahead through that huge Yokai, making all of his attacks miss and allowing for several fast hits before dodging away. My previous technique involved trying to dodge *around* him, which lead inevitably to death.

The side-mission thereafter to take out the bandit boss was entertaining, and really gave me a sense of having grown my skills. I'm really looking forward to seeing the game now that it has opened up.

There is one irritant though: they made the character Irish for no good reason. William Adams, later the first foreign samurai and known as Miura Anjin, was an Englishman born in Kent. Call it pride, but it feels like they took William Wallace and made him Welsh. Adams was a badass of my home country, so it's weird that the history given in the game is that he lost his parents fighting the English. No big deal, but it grates a little every time the character speaks.

But this game. Is. Awesome.

Spelling lesson of the day:

Yo-Kai:
IMAGE(http://img.cinemablend.com/cb/c/6/2/d/8/5/c62d85e1de4824c5d62eef7327b87ed1efd1cf1b2906a4139cbf681fce0f8460.jpg)

Yokai:
IMAGE(http://gameaxis.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/NiohAlpha-03-600x338.jpg)

That has real life implications if summoning ever becomes a thing.

Anyone playing on a pro?

I have a normal PS4 and the game is running perfectly fine for me, but I'm considering picking up a pro for this and Horizon coming up but I'd like to know it's going to be at least a little bit of an improvement either visually or in terms of performance, so I don't feel like I'm completely wasting money

Aristophan wrote:

It turned out that there was much more to explore after that fight. I wonder if you summon someone for that fight if they have to continue or if they can leave.

They continue.
Or they can self-quit, but then get 1/2 rewards.

I see people seeking help in Nioh are no different than they were in Souls or Bloodborne.

Successfully connected with 5 different people to help kill the bat lady boss, which I can solo in about 45 seconds now. 3 of the 5 went in too aggressively and died immediately. One was playing intelligently and I had hopes that we would actually win, then she got to 15% health and he went brain dead and ran in trying to finish her off and died. One mainly hung back and let me do the work, and just darted in for safe hits and darted out, so we won that easily. I then went to the lightning dog mission, where 2 out of 2 were proud recipients of the "OMG he's so low I'll just run in and finish him" death. That ended my helping for the night.

So, tip. If you're stuck on a boss to the point where you need to summon help, bear in mind that you're almost certainly getting someone who has beaten that boss already, and let them take the risks. And for the love of all that is holy, when a boss is low, remember what got you to that point and don't suddenly go stupid and start button mashing.

cls33 wrote:

Anyone playing on a pro?

I'm on a pro about 75% of the time, and the difference is indeed noticeable. Not "I'd run out and trade in for a pro just for this" noticeable, but the increased resolution is nifty. I was in a position where I needed a second PS4, so I figured I'd go big.