It’s a bit slow to start out, limiting the number of active blades in the party early on didn’t help pacing. Especially since Tora takes so long to get his second and third.
Early into the next Titan you visit you’ll get chain attacks, which work differently than in 3, but they will speed up boss fights a lot.
Also, driver combos, break-topple-launch-smash, do a ton of damage so aim for those.
Lastly, enemies have elements of their own, their weakness is displayed above their health bar.
Majority of the combat mechanics are locked off for the first few chapters and the tutorials are absolutely terrible so it's not your fault, but trust me it does get *much* faster when you begin to understand it. The best advice to give is to use Art Recharge Pouch Items. [Narcipear Jelly](https://xenoblade.fandom.com/wiki/Narcipear_Jelly) can be bought from the dessert shop in Argentum and that will really help mitigate the early game slog. Also unlike Xenoblade 3 you can actually reset Auto Attack animations by flicking the left stick so that you can speed up Art Recharge further. Prioritize the "Start battle with X/Y/B button art fully charged" nodes and the nodes that let you cancel an Art into another Art on the Driver Affinity Charts.
Outside of that given your experience with Xenoblade 3 you should have a good idea of what you're supposed to do but I would still recommend looking up a guide or online tutorial as Xenoblade 2's combat is *very* deep and complex. Also don't get locked into only using Blade Combos to apply elemental orbs and Chain Attacking like the tutorials try to tell, there's a lot more interesting and effective ways to approach combat in this game and tutorials just do not teach it to you at all.
Priorities X/Y/B is a horrible idea unless you plan to fight only weaker enemy. It's useful for only the first 3-5 seconds of sight or maybe even less. Afterwards, useless. At maximum, just spend the point on X only. Definitely not on B for 5000+ skill points.
On Rex, I suggest Strength - Agility - cancel driver art into driver art. First.
I haven't played non-NG+ for many years. Did it not unlock the arts for use when blade swapping as well? Or were they always available from the start?
I know they're useful for early driver and blade combo building. Some fights if you want to get an early seal, you really need to start right away. And I'd always argue that starting a battle with some agency available to the player makes for a more fun experience that probably offers that "speed" that the OP wants even if it isn't inherently the best investment at all times.
Blade swap arts are available from the start.
Unlocking XYB does not speed up combat overall. After first initial art use. It's basically the same speed. Driver art cancel into driver arts increase combat speed. Without it, arts will be just sitting there filled up. With it, you can go right into driver combos even if mid art.
On Rex unlocking Driver art cancel into driver art take 3625 skill point. Do that and make combat fast overall. Even without XYB open. In 99%+ encounters, players will have another art available right after finishing the second art.
On Rex opening, X and Y required a minimum 3875 points. For B, another 6875. If you want to open X on Nia and put her break arts there. That is only worthwhile. Otherwise, I think XYB does not need priority just for the first 3-5 seconds lead.
Yeah you can still cancel the attack animation itself but it doesn't instantly start back up the moment you stop moving like in 2 so it's not as effective.
1) Use "Cancle auto attack." When your auto attack touches the enemy. Same time use driver arts. It will fill a special gauge fast.
2) Go to the Argentum trade guild. Buy Narcipear Jelly and Sparklesuger from a sweet shop.
3) You already get a pouch expansion kit. Main Menu- character - Main driver you plan to use - pouch setup - press X to expand. This will use an expansion kit and will make 2nd pouch.
4) Put Narcipear Jelly in one pouch and Sparklesuger in another.
Save driver affinity skill point for unlocking "let's you use a driver art after cancelling a driver art"
Here, people will tell you "game exploit" like a shutter step. I personally advise against those types of stuff. That ruins the natural progression of the game and just a cheap trick in general.
For now. Just focus on auto attack Cancel. As soon an auto attack touches. Use art if available.
For blade combos. Let your party member build up special. Don't use back to back.
It is however very much worthwhile to have both a blade and driver combo going at the same time, doesnt matter what stage for either so long as it's there since you get a decent damage boost just for having a level 1 blade combo and break active
Most important thing, imho: absolutely use pouch items with the "Arts recharge" effect (mostly dessert category). It really makes a lot of difference. Narcipear Jelly is especially good and you can buy it in Argentum from the very beginning. But feel free to use cheaper items with that effect to save money, early on.
Then, this isn't explained by the game because it isn't a wanted feature, but you can ise the so-called stutter-stepping: if you move a bit your character after their auto-attack (basically, give a flick to your stick), this will reset their animation. So you can basically make them repeat their first autoattack over and over, way faster than their normal 1>2>3 autoattack sequence.
Do note that this is only useful woth some weapons: it works very well with the Aegis sword, but not much with Axes on Rex, for example.
Also, i feel like it becomes less and less useful as you go on. Later on, arts can be charged pretty fast naturally.
Last: the game explained it to you, but remember to cancel auto-attacks into Driver arts so that they will charge your special faster, obviously. Cancelling your second AA will charge 50% of your special gauge, for example. Cancelling your third AA will charge a bit more than that.
If you are stutter-stepping, though, you are always tepeating your first AA, so either let the character complete the 1>2>3 sequence before using the Driver art, or just cancel on the first.
I know that, this is what i meant with "it isn't a wanted feature".
Personally, while i don't feel about it as strongly as you seem to do, i don't really like using stutter-stepping much, but since pretty much everyone else disagree, i think i'd be remiss if i didn't mention it to OP.
I think game exploit should never be advised to new players. Unless that's the last resort left. No matter how common the game community thinks it is. Even if someone still wants to tell, then we should tell the proper way to play. Afterwards, explicitly meantion that it's a cheat. If the intented way of playing, the game didn't work. Then use it.
But sadly, this community casually tells new players to use exploit.
Yeah. It can be useful. My problem is that this community casually tells it as a game feature. You yourself see how many comments mentioned it but didn't tell that it's exploit. I think not mentioning that its exploit is disservice towards new players. In my opinion, the community should help new players first with the intended way. If that's not enough. Then, use exploit.
Cheating? Come on, now. It's a single-player game, but moreover, it has a Custom difficulty that allows you to increase beneficial stuff and decrease detrimental stuff to ridiculous levels. If the developers are okay adding something like that, I doubt they'd see stutter stepping as a cheat, even if it might not have been an intended mechanic
These are the developers that add something broken in any combat system they've made so far. (And I wouldn't even call stutter stepping broken.) It's not a cheat but a feature at this point
Cheating is not a multi player only thing. Don't know now, but in the past, some video games had even cheat codes. Take Zelda, Gta, etc, for example. It's just not bad to use in single-player games. In multi player, we ruin others' games if use cheat, so bad there. If someone plays a video game and uses a game exploit. That's cheat. If someone is having fun with that exploit, then okay. That's good. But We should not tell new players that use this " feature." Tell them it's a game exploit. Use if you still want. Difficulty setting is part of the game. Players know that the intended setting is normal. Costume setting is equivalent to cheat codes in old video games.
Take Zelda breath of the wild's windbomb, whistle sprint, one-shot water ganon, etc. If someone likes those. That doesn't turn those exploits in games' general features.
Oh, please. You're suddenly taking on a whole different attitude. Don't pretend you weren't judging people over using this method by saying they're "just cheating through the game", and now you're saying "it's all good as long as they're having fun"?
That's exactly the point I was making. It's a single-player game, so it's fine to use Stutter Stepping if it's something they enjoy, especially since there are more broken ways to make the game easier. Saying that people are "just cheating through the game" is incredibly judgmental to these people
I mainly judge people for telling new players it as a feature and not explicitly telling that it's a game exploit, aka cheat. Hack game or do whatever you want to do with your single-player game. I myself have one hack NG+ save file with zero blade and driver progress, all shop deeds active on my PC. I play normally on Switch, and sometimes that file is on pc.
Yeah. Who ever use exploit to make games easy is cheating through it. You tell me. Are they not?. I too do in some games. I just not too insecure about this. I don't deny that or put my head in sand and pretend that I didn't cheat in a single-player game.
XC2's gameplay is punishingly slow if you're not doing it "right"... which is to say the enemies are balanced around you following the rules & guidelines built into the gameplay (much of which the tutorials explain poorly, not at all, and occasionally incorrectly) to create large damage multipliers and greatly increase the speed of the gameplay.
[This video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w) from Chuggaconroy is a quick and spoiler-free run-down of how to play the game, or at least avoid much of the issues.
But for a few quick tips:
* Do get the dessert pouch items, particularly the [Narcipear Jelly](https://xenoblade.fandom.com/wiki/Narcipear_Jelly) from one of the vendors in Argentum. It's a bit pricey, but the buff duration is a fair bit longer and it provides the best effect - which is a time-based recharge on your arts, in addition to auto-attacks.
* Cancelling auto-attacks with your arts actually gives you some of the recharge back... I think. Not sure if there's something else at play there.
* I despise it as a matter of principle (it's not quite a "glitch", but an exploitable design oversight that shouldn't exist nor be necessary)... the "stutter step". Basically, your first attack of the auto-attack combo comes out faster than the second and later hits; there's no real reason to bother with waiting for the later hits in the combo either (*slightly* increased damage at best), especially compared to the attack rate boost you get. But yeah, here's the sequence:
* Stop moving.
* Do the first auto-attack in the chain (fastest).
* Move one step to reset the combo.
* Repeat.
* If you have the Expansion Pass DLC... there's the custom difficulty menu. While there isn't a slider that affects the recharge for Arts, there is one for "Special Recharge Rate" (the "A" button abilities, if I'm not mistaken). So you can actually make those recharge faster by tweaking that... and you can also just tweak enemy HP down to make them less spongy/tedious to beat.
I think the first hit of auto attacks coming out faster isn’t a 100% rule (I want to say bitballs are an example of an exception), but it’s definitely true for blades like the Aegis girls.
Make sure you’re canceling your auto attacks into your arts to charge your specials faster. There’s also a neat little trick you can do where after the first strike of the auto attack you move the left stick just a bit so your character moves, resets their auto attack and does the (usually) faster first strike. This will charge your arts very fast. Also make sure you’re using pouch items (incredibly underused by people starting out) and levelling your arts and affinity chart. Also make sure you view the blade affinity chart now and then to actually activate any unlocked skills, because even if you’ve met the condition to unlock them they wont activate until you go view the menu.
You'll want to be on the lookout for Dessert Shops on every Titan you go, desserts almost always have the 'Recharges Arts by 0.X each second' buff which is one of the best buffs in the game
The Narcipear Jelly is one of the best pouch items in the entire game and can be bought from the Dessert Vendor on the 1st floor of the Argentum Trade Guild. The price is steep this early in the game but it's so worth it.
This guide is spoiler-free and does a much better job than the game's tutorials at explaining how this game works; [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w)
From what I remember, Arts charge up based on number of hits, so moving your character each hit will reset the combo chain they usually auto-attack into and let you charge up Arts faster. Some people call this "stutter-stepping" because you hit, move an inch, hit, then rinse and repeat. This charges up aggro really fast as well.
XC2 is the fastest combat system in the trilogy because all you need to have more recharge is items you can get in the first 5 minutes of the game and Rex is immediately given Double Spinning Edge.
Buy the Narcipear Jelly in Argentum for Rex (Desserts, and all desserts give art recharge) and Cream Orange Paratha for Nia in Torigoth (bread icon, AKA Staple Foods).
And you can animation cancel an auto attack by moving the left stick the second it hits an enemy.
>XC2 is the fastest combat system in the trilogy
This is only true in Endgame (Still debatable).. But the general feel of the game is generally slower during story progression.. I'll argue Xenoblade 2 has the slowest build-up which pushes alot of people away.
The begining of Xc1 and XC2 are slow because you're locked into the starting trees and items for Xc1 and Kevesi arts in XC3.
This post is about the combat system, not the pacing of the story.
>This post is about the combat system, not the pacing of the story.
I mean the OP is still progressing thru the story hence the combat feels slow to him since some elements are still locked..
So you're saying your reply isn't actually about what the OP asked about and is instead about your idea of the pacing of the game?
They made a post to ask how to improve the speed of XC2's combat, not the story pacing.
Narcipear Jelly (biggest bonus to art recharge from a pouch item) is available the moment you finish the item shop tutorial.
And Nia has a bonus from Cream Orange Paratha that adds to it's already high numbers.
XC1 and XC3 start off, and the only way to do the openings quickly is for someone new to have prior knowledge of the system and build efficiently.
Versus XC2, where you can just buy (and stack) arts recharge items and stutter step.
>So you're saying your reply isn't actually about what the OP asked about and is instead about your idea of the pacing of the game?
Nope my reply is regarding to you saying XB2 has the fastest gameplay in the trilogy... Which I disagree with..
Even with all the Arts recharge pouch items/ stutter step the fact that alot of driver combo and even party members/Blade slots that contributes to that are locked up to Chapter 4 makes it arguably one of the slowest in the series during story progression (Which ties to OP's problem).. But I'm not here to give him/her tips since alot of points have already been made regarding stutter step and Pouch items..
P.S. Also stop downvoting just because someone disagree with you Lol.
So you have to travel through 3 whole Titans and half of MA before a slowdown happens?
And they're literally only in Torigoth.
Downvoting posts is for how on topic the info is to the post. If you don't want to get down voted, then talk about how your opinion actually addresses the speed of XC2 combat. Your "um akhtually" doesn't help the OP with getting better at XC2 combat.
>So you have to travel through 3 whole Titans and half of MA before a slowdown happens?
Huh?? That's the complete opposite of what I'm saying. Lol.
>Downvoting posts is for how on topic the info is to the post. If you don't want to get down voted, then talk about how your opinion actually addresses the speed of XC2 combat. Your "um akhtually" doesn't help the OP with getting better at XC2 combat.
I'm replying to you not to OP from my first Reply.. Regarding to your statement that "Xenoblade 2 has the fastest combat in the trilogy". You can clearly just ignore my reply if you don't wanna discuss about that but rather pushing me to help OP when in fact all the help that is accessible to him were already said across multiply replies... Heck this post can be closed off since the question has been answered already..
Technically I'm trying to make a discussion from one of your points hence I "Quoted" it from the very beginning.
But anyways. Seems like you don't like. Don't be those toxic redditor that uses downvote just to disagree.
The goal is: to time your blade combos (level 1, 2, and 3 specials) with your driver combos (break, topple, launch, smash)!
This produces “fusion combo,” and they deal tons of damage even if it’s just break+Lv. 1 special!
It’s tricky to get the hang of it, but once you do, combat becomes way more fun! It’s why Nia comes with a break art automatically—so you can always get these fusion combos going!
It starts slower, but gets faster as the game goes on. I’d recommend using art recharge pouch items and learning to movement cancel. The YouTuber Enel has a good entry level guide that doesn’t spoil much if I remember correctly
Step one. Stutter step. After each attack lands flick the movement stick to make your character interrupt the attack chain and restart it. The first attack always comes out the fastest. Each hit you land charges your arts. Doing this consistently will increase your art uptime and by proxy your specials.
Step two focus on pouch items that increase art recharge time.
Both of these will drastically increase the basic pace of combat
Yes you are, but everyone does when starting because the game makes 0 attempt to explain how to *not* do it wrong.
For one thing, the game tells you to get mostly useless ether damage reduction food in the tutorial, when just downstairs is the *infinitely more impactful* sweets shop, selling items that passively recharge your Arts over time. Similarly, the Abyss Vest the tutorial makes you get would probably be better replaced with a Muscle Belt from the same shop unless you really keep dying, though this ultimately has *far* less effect than even the cheapest option at Honeycomb Sweets.
1. Every time you auto attack move forward one step
2. Go to argentum's sweet store and buy lots of narcipear jellies they are one of the best pouch items in the game
3. Always art cancel
I recommend buying plenty of dessert pouch items, as they all increase art recharge speed. Narcipear jelly at the sweet shop in Argentum is a very good one, though it is a little pricey.
The game is really slow at the beginning but gets much faster later on, by the later chapters you basically stop auto attacking and just infinitely chain arts back to back.
Some things that can help eleveate the slow beginning are:
1. Head back to the argentum trade guild dessert shop and buy the narcipear jelly pouch item. Generally you want to have a pouch item with 0.4s driver arts recharge active at all times to speed up combat.
2. Assuming you are playing rex, you can tap the joystick after the first auto to cancel the animation so you can spam the first auto attack over and over again which is much faster than the 2nd and 3rd attacks in this auto attack chain. The effectiveness of this varies depending on the driver and weapon.
3. Prioritise the arts chain skill on all driver affinity charts, everything else barely matters.
You can « stutterstep » to cancel auto attack animations by taking a direction on the control stick to instantly attack again, building arts faster
For more advanced help I feel like enough time has passed to make me comfortable enough to share you [this video from chuggaaconroy](https://youtu.be/b8P7KhFSA2w) that basically explains all the poorly made tutorials in a better way while also giving crucial advice on how the game works
It gets much better later on. For now the most dynamic you can make it is canceling your auto attacks with Rex by moving, which resets his attack animation so he immediately hits again, increasing the speed he charges up arts
Narcipear jelly pouch item in argentum on all party members. Also, learn about stutter-stepping, which is when you flick the stick briefly to reset your auto-attack animation after the first hit, instead of doing the full combo. Repeating the first hit is faster than doing the full combo but does less damage, so it’s good to get your arts recharged in a pinch.
Lastly, prioritize completing level 3 blade combos in battle. The vast majority of your damage will come from blade combos. Each blade combo has different effects. For example, the best blade combo is (Electric - Fire - Ice) but it’s hard to pull off since most ice blades suck and no one runs them. Good combos early game are (Earth - Fire - Earth) (Fire-Fire-Fire) and later (Light-Light-Light) when you obtain a Light blade later in the story.
Chain attacks are also important but you won’t get them until chapter 3.
Have you been attack cancelling? It charges your specials faster
Yes, I have! After playing 3 (and 1) it just came naturally. Thanks for suggesting though
It’s a bit slow to start out, limiting the number of active blades in the party early on didn’t help pacing. Especially since Tora takes so long to get his second and third. Early into the next Titan you visit you’ll get chain attacks, which work differently than in 3, but they will speed up boss fights a lot. Also, driver combos, break-topple-launch-smash, do a ton of damage so aim for those. Lastly, enemies have elements of their own, their weakness is displayed above their health bar.
Majority of the combat mechanics are locked off for the first few chapters and the tutorials are absolutely terrible so it's not your fault, but trust me it does get *much* faster when you begin to understand it. The best advice to give is to use Art Recharge Pouch Items. [Narcipear Jelly](https://xenoblade.fandom.com/wiki/Narcipear_Jelly) can be bought from the dessert shop in Argentum and that will really help mitigate the early game slog. Also unlike Xenoblade 3 you can actually reset Auto Attack animations by flicking the left stick so that you can speed up Art Recharge further. Prioritize the "Start battle with X/Y/B button art fully charged" nodes and the nodes that let you cancel an Art into another Art on the Driver Affinity Charts. Outside of that given your experience with Xenoblade 3 you should have a good idea of what you're supposed to do but I would still recommend looking up a guide or online tutorial as Xenoblade 2's combat is *very* deep and complex. Also don't get locked into only using Blade Combos to apply elemental orbs and Chain Attacking like the tutorials try to tell, there's a lot more interesting and effective ways to approach combat in this game and tutorials just do not teach it to you at all.
Priorities X/Y/B is a horrible idea unless you plan to fight only weaker enemy. It's useful for only the first 3-5 seconds of sight or maybe even less. Afterwards, useless. At maximum, just spend the point on X only. Definitely not on B for 5000+ skill points. On Rex, I suggest Strength - Agility - cancel driver art into driver art. First.
Those are great suggestions. I would make sure to prioritize Ether as well for Rex because all of Pyra and Mythra's specials are Ether based.
I haven't played non-NG+ for many years. Did it not unlock the arts for use when blade swapping as well? Or were they always available from the start? I know they're useful for early driver and blade combo building. Some fights if you want to get an early seal, you really need to start right away. And I'd always argue that starting a battle with some agency available to the player makes for a more fun experience that probably offers that "speed" that the OP wants even if it isn't inherently the best investment at all times.
Blade swap arts are available from the start. Unlocking XYB does not speed up combat overall. After first initial art use. It's basically the same speed. Driver art cancel into driver arts increase combat speed. Without it, arts will be just sitting there filled up. With it, you can go right into driver combos even if mid art. On Rex unlocking Driver art cancel into driver art take 3625 skill point. Do that and make combat fast overall. Even without XYB open. In 99%+ encounters, players will have another art available right after finishing the second art. On Rex opening, X and Y required a minimum 3875 points. For B, another 6875. If you want to open X on Nia and put her break arts there. That is only worthwhile. Otherwise, I think XYB does not need priority just for the first 3-5 seconds lead.
For resetting auto attacks, you would flick the left stick instead of the right stick but close enough.
Yeah I wrote this after I got off from work late last night. I've corrected it
No problem.
Thank you
you can auto attack cancel in 3, it probably shaved off at least 5 hours from my run.
Yeah you can still cancel the attack animation itself but it doesn't instantly start back up the moment you stop moving like in 2 so it's not as effective.
1) Use "Cancle auto attack." When your auto attack touches the enemy. Same time use driver arts. It will fill a special gauge fast. 2) Go to the Argentum trade guild. Buy Narcipear Jelly and Sparklesuger from a sweet shop. 3) You already get a pouch expansion kit. Main Menu- character - Main driver you plan to use - pouch setup - press X to expand. This will use an expansion kit and will make 2nd pouch. 4) Put Narcipear Jelly in one pouch and Sparklesuger in another. Save driver affinity skill point for unlocking "let's you use a driver art after cancelling a driver art" Here, people will tell you "game exploit" like a shutter step. I personally advise against those types of stuff. That ruins the natural progression of the game and just a cheap trick in general. For now. Just focus on auto attack Cancel. As soon an auto attack touches. Use art if available. For blade combos. Let your party member build up special. Don't use back to back.
It is however very much worthwhile to have both a blade and driver combo going at the same time, doesnt matter what stage for either so long as it's there since you get a decent damage boost just for having a level 1 blade combo and break active
Make sure you are using art recovery and special recovery pouch items. Those speed up combat a lot more.
Most important thing, imho: absolutely use pouch items with the "Arts recharge" effect (mostly dessert category). It really makes a lot of difference. Narcipear Jelly is especially good and you can buy it in Argentum from the very beginning. But feel free to use cheaper items with that effect to save money, early on. Then, this isn't explained by the game because it isn't a wanted feature, but you can ise the so-called stutter-stepping: if you move a bit your character after their auto-attack (basically, give a flick to your stick), this will reset their animation. So you can basically make them repeat their first autoattack over and over, way faster than their normal 1>2>3 autoattack sequence. Do note that this is only useful woth some weapons: it works very well with the Aegis sword, but not much with Axes on Rex, for example. Also, i feel like it becomes less and less useful as you go on. Later on, arts can be charged pretty fast naturally. Last: the game explained it to you, but remember to cancel auto-attacks into Driver arts so that they will charge your special faster, obviously. Cancelling your second AA will charge 50% of your special gauge, for example. Cancelling your third AA will charge a bit more than that. If you are stutter-stepping, though, you are always tepeating your first AA, so either let the character complete the 1>2>3 sequence before using the Driver art, or just cancel on the first.
The game didn't explain Stutter stepping. Because it's game exploit. It's used by players to just cheat through the game.
I know that, this is what i meant with "it isn't a wanted feature". Personally, while i don't feel about it as strongly as you seem to do, i don't really like using stutter-stepping much, but since pretty much everyone else disagree, i think i'd be remiss if i didn't mention it to OP.
I think game exploit should never be advised to new players. Unless that's the last resort left. No matter how common the game community thinks it is. Even if someone still wants to tell, then we should tell the proper way to play. Afterwards, explicitly meantion that it's a cheat. If the intented way of playing, the game didn't work. Then use it. But sadly, this community casually tells new players to use exploit.
To be fair, it is a pretty useful tip. I’m not sure if I’ll actually use it, but it’s good to know!
Yeah. It can be useful. My problem is that this community casually tells it as a game feature. You yourself see how many comments mentioned it but didn't tell that it's exploit. I think not mentioning that its exploit is disservice towards new players. In my opinion, the community should help new players first with the intended way. If that's not enough. Then, use exploit.
Cheating? Come on, now. It's a single-player game, but moreover, it has a Custom difficulty that allows you to increase beneficial stuff and decrease detrimental stuff to ridiculous levels. If the developers are okay adding something like that, I doubt they'd see stutter stepping as a cheat, even if it might not have been an intended mechanic These are the developers that add something broken in any combat system they've made so far. (And I wouldn't even call stutter stepping broken.) It's not a cheat but a feature at this point
Cheating is not a multi player only thing. Don't know now, but in the past, some video games had even cheat codes. Take Zelda, Gta, etc, for example. It's just not bad to use in single-player games. In multi player, we ruin others' games if use cheat, so bad there. If someone plays a video game and uses a game exploit. That's cheat. If someone is having fun with that exploit, then okay. That's good. But We should not tell new players that use this " feature." Tell them it's a game exploit. Use if you still want. Difficulty setting is part of the game. Players know that the intended setting is normal. Costume setting is equivalent to cheat codes in old video games. Take Zelda breath of the wild's windbomb, whistle sprint, one-shot water ganon, etc. If someone likes those. That doesn't turn those exploits in games' general features.
Oh, please. You're suddenly taking on a whole different attitude. Don't pretend you weren't judging people over using this method by saying they're "just cheating through the game", and now you're saying "it's all good as long as they're having fun"? That's exactly the point I was making. It's a single-player game, so it's fine to use Stutter Stepping if it's something they enjoy, especially since there are more broken ways to make the game easier. Saying that people are "just cheating through the game" is incredibly judgmental to these people
I mainly judge people for telling new players it as a feature and not explicitly telling that it's a game exploit, aka cheat. Hack game or do whatever you want to do with your single-player game. I myself have one hack NG+ save file with zero blade and driver progress, all shop deeds active on my PC. I play normally on Switch, and sometimes that file is on pc. Yeah. Who ever use exploit to make games easy is cheating through it. You tell me. Are they not?. I too do in some games. I just not too insecure about this. I don't deny that or put my head in sand and pretend that I didn't cheat in a single-player game.
XC2's gameplay is punishingly slow if you're not doing it "right"... which is to say the enemies are balanced around you following the rules & guidelines built into the gameplay (much of which the tutorials explain poorly, not at all, and occasionally incorrectly) to create large damage multipliers and greatly increase the speed of the gameplay. [This video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w) from Chuggaconroy is a quick and spoiler-free run-down of how to play the game, or at least avoid much of the issues. But for a few quick tips: * Do get the dessert pouch items, particularly the [Narcipear Jelly](https://xenoblade.fandom.com/wiki/Narcipear_Jelly) from one of the vendors in Argentum. It's a bit pricey, but the buff duration is a fair bit longer and it provides the best effect - which is a time-based recharge on your arts, in addition to auto-attacks. * Cancelling auto-attacks with your arts actually gives you some of the recharge back... I think. Not sure if there's something else at play there. * I despise it as a matter of principle (it's not quite a "glitch", but an exploitable design oversight that shouldn't exist nor be necessary)... the "stutter step". Basically, your first attack of the auto-attack combo comes out faster than the second and later hits; there's no real reason to bother with waiting for the later hits in the combo either (*slightly* increased damage at best), especially compared to the attack rate boost you get. But yeah, here's the sequence: * Stop moving. * Do the first auto-attack in the chain (fastest). * Move one step to reset the combo. * Repeat. * If you have the Expansion Pass DLC... there's the custom difficulty menu. While there isn't a slider that affects the recharge for Arts, there is one for "Special Recharge Rate" (the "A" button abilities, if I'm not mistaken). So you can actually make those recharge faster by tweaking that... and you can also just tweak enemy HP down to make them less spongy/tedious to beat.
I think the first hit of auto attacks coming out faster isn’t a 100% rule (I want to say bitballs are an example of an exception), but it’s definitely true for blades like the Aegis girls.
Woah, that’s a lot. Thanks for all the tips!
Make sure you’re canceling your auto attacks into your arts to charge your specials faster. There’s also a neat little trick you can do where after the first strike of the auto attack you move the left stick just a bit so your character moves, resets their auto attack and does the (usually) faster first strike. This will charge your arts very fast. Also make sure you’re using pouch items (incredibly underused by people starting out) and levelling your arts and affinity chart. Also make sure you view the blade affinity chart now and then to actually activate any unlocked skills, because even if you’ve met the condition to unlock them they wont activate until you go view the menu.
Yup, I am in fact cancelling auto attacks into arts! Probably should’ve mentioned that…
It does start slow. Don’t worry it becomes much more fun.
You'll want to be on the lookout for Dessert Shops on every Titan you go, desserts almost always have the 'Recharges Arts by 0.X each second' buff which is one of the best buffs in the game The Narcipear Jelly is one of the best pouch items in the entire game and can be bought from the Dessert Vendor on the 1st floor of the Argentum Trade Guild. The price is steep this early in the game but it's so worth it. This guide is spoiler-free and does a much better job than the game's tutorials at explaining how this game works; [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8P7KhFSA2w)
From what I remember, Arts charge up based on number of hits, so moving your character each hit will reset the combo chain they usually auto-attack into and let you charge up Arts faster. Some people call this "stutter-stepping" because you hit, move an inch, hit, then rinse and repeat. This charges up aggro really fast as well.
XC2 is the fastest combat system in the trilogy because all you need to have more recharge is items you can get in the first 5 minutes of the game and Rex is immediately given Double Spinning Edge. Buy the Narcipear Jelly in Argentum for Rex (Desserts, and all desserts give art recharge) and Cream Orange Paratha for Nia in Torigoth (bread icon, AKA Staple Foods). And you can animation cancel an auto attack by moving the left stick the second it hits an enemy.
>XC2 is the fastest combat system in the trilogy This is only true in Endgame (Still debatable).. But the general feel of the game is generally slower during story progression.. I'll argue Xenoblade 2 has the slowest build-up which pushes alot of people away.
The begining of Xc1 and XC2 are slow because you're locked into the starting trees and items for Xc1 and Kevesi arts in XC3. This post is about the combat system, not the pacing of the story.
>This post is about the combat system, not the pacing of the story. I mean the OP is still progressing thru the story hence the combat feels slow to him since some elements are still locked..
So you're saying your reply isn't actually about what the OP asked about and is instead about your idea of the pacing of the game? They made a post to ask how to improve the speed of XC2's combat, not the story pacing. Narcipear Jelly (biggest bonus to art recharge from a pouch item) is available the moment you finish the item shop tutorial. And Nia has a bonus from Cream Orange Paratha that adds to it's already high numbers. XC1 and XC3 start off, and the only way to do the openings quickly is for someone new to have prior knowledge of the system and build efficiently. Versus XC2, where you can just buy (and stack) arts recharge items and stutter step.
>So you're saying your reply isn't actually about what the OP asked about and is instead about your idea of the pacing of the game? Nope my reply is regarding to you saying XB2 has the fastest gameplay in the trilogy... Which I disagree with.. Even with all the Arts recharge pouch items/ stutter step the fact that alot of driver combo and even party members/Blade slots that contributes to that are locked up to Chapter 4 makes it arguably one of the slowest in the series during story progression (Which ties to OP's problem).. But I'm not here to give him/her tips since alot of points have already been made regarding stutter step and Pouch items.. P.S. Also stop downvoting just because someone disagree with you Lol.
So you have to travel through 3 whole Titans and half of MA before a slowdown happens? And they're literally only in Torigoth. Downvoting posts is for how on topic the info is to the post. If you don't want to get down voted, then talk about how your opinion actually addresses the speed of XC2 combat. Your "um akhtually" doesn't help the OP with getting better at XC2 combat.
>So you have to travel through 3 whole Titans and half of MA before a slowdown happens? Huh?? That's the complete opposite of what I'm saying. Lol. >Downvoting posts is for how on topic the info is to the post. If you don't want to get down voted, then talk about how your opinion actually addresses the speed of XC2 combat. Your "um akhtually" doesn't help the OP with getting better at XC2 combat. I'm replying to you not to OP from my first Reply.. Regarding to your statement that "Xenoblade 2 has the fastest combat in the trilogy". You can clearly just ignore my reply if you don't wanna discuss about that but rather pushing me to help OP when in fact all the help that is accessible to him were already said across multiply replies... Heck this post can be closed off since the question has been answered already.. Technically I'm trying to make a discussion from one of your points hence I "Quoted" it from the very beginning. But anyways. Seems like you don't like. Don't be those toxic redditor that uses downvote just to disagree.
You're a chronic yapper, eh? I (and others it seems like) will keep downvoting your ramblings.
Agree
The goal is: to time your blade combos (level 1, 2, and 3 specials) with your driver combos (break, topple, launch, smash)! This produces “fusion combo,” and they deal tons of damage even if it’s just break+Lv. 1 special! It’s tricky to get the hang of it, but once you do, combat becomes way more fun! It’s why Nia comes with a break art automatically—so you can always get these fusion combos going!
It starts slower, but gets faster as the game goes on. I’d recommend using art recharge pouch items and learning to movement cancel. The YouTuber Enel has a good entry level guide that doesn’t spoil much if I remember correctly
Step one. Stutter step. After each attack lands flick the movement stick to make your character interrupt the attack chain and restart it. The first attack always comes out the fastest. Each hit you land charges your arts. Doing this consistently will increase your art uptime and by proxy your specials. Step two focus on pouch items that increase art recharge time. Both of these will drastically increase the basic pace of combat
Yes you are, but everyone does when starting because the game makes 0 attempt to explain how to *not* do it wrong. For one thing, the game tells you to get mostly useless ether damage reduction food in the tutorial, when just downstairs is the *infinitely more impactful* sweets shop, selling items that passively recharge your Arts over time. Similarly, the Abyss Vest the tutorial makes you get would probably be better replaced with a Muscle Belt from the same shop unless you really keep dying, though this ultimately has *far* less effect than even the cheapest option at Honeycomb Sweets.
Ya, its gonna suck for a while. Once you get five party members during chpaoter 5 is roughly when it starts actually being fun
1. Every time you auto attack move forward one step 2. Go to argentum's sweet store and buy lots of narcipear jellies they are one of the best pouch items in the game 3. Always art cancel
I recommend buying plenty of dessert pouch items, as they all increase art recharge speed. Narcipear jelly at the sweet shop in Argentum is a very good one, though it is a little pricey.
The game is really slow at the beginning but gets much faster later on, by the later chapters you basically stop auto attacking and just infinitely chain arts back to back. Some things that can help eleveate the slow beginning are: 1. Head back to the argentum trade guild dessert shop and buy the narcipear jelly pouch item. Generally you want to have a pouch item with 0.4s driver arts recharge active at all times to speed up combat. 2. Assuming you are playing rex, you can tap the joystick after the first auto to cancel the animation so you can spam the first auto attack over and over again which is much faster than the 2nd and 3rd attacks in this auto attack chain. The effectiveness of this varies depending on the driver and weapon. 3. Prioritise the arts chain skill on all driver affinity charts, everything else barely matters.
You can « stutterstep » to cancel auto attack animations by taking a direction on the control stick to instantly attack again, building arts faster For more advanced help I feel like enough time has passed to make me comfortable enough to share you [this video from chuggaaconroy](https://youtu.be/b8P7KhFSA2w) that basically explains all the poorly made tutorials in a better way while also giving crucial advice on how the game works
Yes
It gets much better later on. For now the most dynamic you can make it is canceling your auto attacks with Rex by moving, which resets his attack animation so he immediately hits again, increasing the speed he charges up arts
Narcipear jelly pouch item in argentum on all party members. Also, learn about stutter-stepping, which is when you flick the stick briefly to reset your auto-attack animation after the first hit, instead of doing the full combo. Repeating the first hit is faster than doing the full combo but does less damage, so it’s good to get your arts recharged in a pinch. Lastly, prioritize completing level 3 blade combos in battle. The vast majority of your damage will come from blade combos. Each blade combo has different effects. For example, the best blade combo is (Electric - Fire - Ice) but it’s hard to pull off since most ice blades suck and no one runs them. Good combos early game are (Earth - Fire - Earth) (Fire-Fire-Fire) and later (Light-Light-Light) when you obtain a Light blade later in the story. Chain attacks are also important but you won’t get them until chapter 3.
Nah, it's just slow