I haven't played PSO2 in like 5 years, and I've got a looot of questions!

Hi everyone :D

I've been hibernating for the past like, 4 1/2 - 5 years, so I haven't played PSO2 in a looong time. I'm planning on jumping on NA PSO2 when it comes out on PC, since a bunch of my friends are getting into the game and I wanna help them along as their senpai. Problem is... there's a lot of stuff that's happened in the last several years that I don't know anything about! D:!!

I quit right after the level 75 cap update, when Ultimate Naberius first came out. So I've got a long list of questions, and I would hope you guys could help answer them! :D

I know there's a "quick questions" thread but this is a lot more than just a few quick questions. This is a lot of big, slow questions! :O

So without further ado... the questions! :D

1. What's the deal with these new classes? Summoner, Hero, Phantom and Etoile. What's their gimmicks? How do they work?

2. I've seen some people mentioning new currencies being a thing? Star Gems and maybe some other stuff? Any details about all that?

3. I've seen some kind of new daily/weekly quest thing that pays out a bunch of money? Can you give me some more details about that?

4. Someone mentioned on a stream that there was a "three button" and "two button" control mode? What's all that about?

5. It seems Franka has a cafe now? What's that all about? What purpose does it serve?

6. I saw someone mention something about stuff like mining and fishing? How does that work? What's the purpose of it?

7. ...Can I eat the fish? :o

8. Someone mentioned that there's PvP now? How's that work?

9. One of the things that made me quit was getting the extra SP by grinding out a bunch of totally empty levels for class cubes? Is that still a thing or did they ever realize it was a terrible idea and change it?

10. The other thing that made me quit was how (from what I remember) 13* weapons, which were brand new at the time, were character bound on pickup and you couldn't use regular grinders to level them up, and instead had to use special grinders that were locked behind crafting (which I always hated) I think. Is this still a thing? How has it changed? Do 14* and 15* weapons suffer the same problems?

11. Someone told me that they basically give you 13* (and higher?) weapons for free by doing certain quests or something. Details on that? Are they viable weapons?

12. I heard the Matter Board got nixed and was replaced by some other method of story progression? Any details on that?

13. Someone told me that it wasn't possible to play earlier parts of the story anymore. Is that true? How are new players supposed to know what's going on?

14. What are some other new features/mechanics that I didn't mention that you think I should know about?

15. I'm planning on playing FO/TE, as it was my favorite class back on PSO2 JP. How should I build my skill tree these days? Especially where should I put my early level points? I know how it USED to be, but it's been a long time and I'm sure stuff has changed!

16. Any new and exciting mechanics I should know about that may affect me as a FO/TE?

17. Pure T-ATK Mag still? Or has that changed for some reason?

18. Is the game still fully enjoyable without paying any money (or little money)? Or has the game become pay to win over the years?

19. Is GameGuard still terrible?

20. Do we have any idea at all how Sega is going to be handling the craploads of costumes, accessories and so on that have come out over the years in the US version?

If I have any more questions, I'll post them here :o

I'd appreciate any answers that you can provide! :D

Boy that is a lot of questions.

1) Summoner uses a Pet system where instead of using different weapons, you use different pets for their niches; it's not everyone's cup of tea, but it can be fun.
Hero, Phantom, and Etoile are Successor classes which use some old weapon but with new mechanics and animations.

2) Assuming they keep things mostly the same on the NA server, Star Gems are used for some things that AC was used for previously, can be used to reduce certain cooldowns, and can also be used in a limited Scratch. SG can be earned in game for free or can be purchased with AC. There are various other currencies, but those are basically just like Stones used for exchanges.

3) Basically, there are new Missions that have certain goals, like run a certain quest type, or grind an item, and once you complete the objective, you can receive the reward.

4) 2-button is the old style controls where you had to set PAs into combos, but with 3-button you set each button as a specific PA, so instead of having to premake a combo, you can make them on the fly.

5/6/7) It is an extra lobby area but it is also the hub for Gathering with Shops for Skill Rings and Cuisine. To Gather, you go to a Free Field and you will see green and blue areas (Mining and Fishing respectively), and you can interact with them to gain materials which are used to obtain the aforementioned Skill Rings and Cuisine.

8) It's... Ok, I guess. It is basically a point gathering battle between two teams where you can gain or lose points by defeating other players.

9) Those COs are still there, but their Class Cube requirement has been reduced (10 total as opposed to like 15(?)) and Class Cubes are much faster to obtain thanks to getting multiple at the cap, and due to all the ways you can get EXP.

10) 13*-15*s use Lambda Grinders, but they are very abundant, with some of the the aforementioned ARKS Missions giving them out.

11) Those "free" weapons are usually used as fodder for to grind higher rarity weapons. Some are obtained with a Certificate form things like Bingo or ARKS Missions, while others are done via the Collect File, which is a system where you pick a "File" from Pudding that you complete by defeating certain enemies or completing certain EQs.

12) It's pretty much that simple. You pick Story Quests from the Quest Counter and do the main and sub events. However, due to these new versions of the Story Missions previously being an Omnibus version that was made to catch players up to speed, many of the Missions have been streamlined to not require repeated runthroughs of them. You can still view any "missing" cutscenes in your MyRoom via the Event Chronicle (at least in the JP version; it may be absent from the NA version).

13) The only part of the story you cannot play again is the tutorial, but all other missions are doable, with the noted changes above.

14) The New-Type (NT) weapon system has replaced the old style of grinding. Basically now you feed weapons to other weapons so they gain EXP, and there is no chance to lose grinds.

15/16) You may be better off checking the Class thread in the Gameplay section for this.

17) For Fo/Te, yeah, 200 T-ATK is still ideal.

18) You can still play perfectly fine for free, and as mentioned, you can even get some perks that were previously only available through AC via free SG (like extra storage).

19) It hasn't caused any widespread issues lately.

20) Still no word on that.

I think I got the broad strokes of most of those questions

Thanks so much for the answers! :D

Could you elaborate on a couple things though?

>Hero, Phantom, and Etoile are Successor classes which use some old weapon but with new mechanics and animations.

What are their new mechanics exactly?

>The New-Type (NT) weapon system has replaced the old style of grinding. Basically now you feed weapons to other weapons so they gain EXP, and there is no chance to lose grinds.

So you don't use Grinders to power up weapons anymore at all? Can you explain this a little more?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Takatsuki

Thanks so much for the answers! :D

Could you elaborate on a couple things though?

>Hero, Phantom, and Etoile are Successor classes which use some old weapon but with new mechanics and animations.

What are their new mechanics exactly?

>The New-Type (NT) weapon system has replaced the old style of grinding. Basically now you feed weapons to other weapons so they gain EXP, and there is no chance to lose grinds.

So you don't use Grinders to power up weapons anymore at all? Can you explain this a little more?

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> It's a bit much to explain clearly without visuals, but basically it goes like this (slightly narrower, but still broad strokes):

Hero is a fast paced class that uses Sword, TMG, and Talis, but their Normal Attacks, PAs, and Weapon Actions are completely unique to the class. The main gimmick is that each weapon has PAs that automatically switch you to one of the other weapons, and this helps raise it's Gear Gauge (which is shared between all weapons) that can be expended for a powerful finisher.

Phantom is similar to Hero in that you build up a shared Gear Gauge for a finisher, but its main gimmick is that you can Shift PAs (similar to Jet Boots), and you can build up Markers on enemies that can be "detonated" to do burst damage and recover PP. This class uses Rifle, Rod, and Katana, again with different Normal Attacks, PAs, and Weapon Actions.

Etoile is pretty much the same, but each Weapon type (DS, DB, and Wand with unique Normal Attacks, PAs, and Weapon Actions) have their own Gauge for their finisher and other weapon-specific abilities. Etoile's main gimmick is that it is a tank that cannot use Techs, and can only heal via Mates and Atomizers.

Also, Phantom and Etoile can be used as subclasses (without having access to their PAs), but Hero cannot.

>You still need grinders. Basically each weapon has 35 levels now, grouped into 3 subsections of 10, and an extra of 5 at the end. You feed fodder weapons to the weapon to level up and at each 10 levels you stop gaining EXP and need to unlock the Potential using Photon Spheres (for the most part); each weapon you use as fodder requires one grinder (1*-12*) or lambda grinder (13*-15*), and different rarities and higher grind levels on the fodder provide more EXP.

I see! Well, that sounds interesting!

What happens if you are playing Hero or Phantom, but you don't have all 3 weapon types to switch to?

Then you only use the ones you have. I play hero with just TMG and Sword since I hate Talis, and I have a Phantom that is Katana only.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Takatsuki

I see! Well, that sounds interesting!

What happens if you are playing Hero or Phantom, but you don't have all 3 weapon types to switch to?

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With Hero, you need at least two of the three (and one of those should be Sword) since there is a decay on your Gear gain that only resets when you switch via one of the PAs.
With Phantom, you can do a single weapon since the Gear gain decay is reset by detonating Markers instead.

Great thread. I just learned a lot too.

With Hero, Etoile, and I'm guessing Phantom as well, you might have a quest or two that requires killing certain enemies or numbers of them with specific weapon types. These would be the only times you absolutely need a weapon of that type, and at this point in the game a cheapo 9-star version usually suffices.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Calsetes

With Hero, Etoile, and I'm guessing Phantom as well, you might have a quest or two that requires killing certain enemies or numbers of them with specific weapon types. These would be the only times you absolutely need a weapon of that type, and at this point in the game a cheapo 9-star version usually suffices.

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That's the lv55-70 and lv71-75 unlock COs, yeah. I completely forgot about those since you only need to clear them once and then they autoclear for all characters.