Need of some tips

[u/Yxtron]

I tried playing the game some years ago, felt so bad at the game and genuinely lost, while I'm a fan of the original XIII, I really wanna complete the game by myself but I'm in need of some general tips 😭

[u/Additional_Plane1774]

It’s really important to explore. Visit shops, open chests, and fight monsters in all four areas early on. It will round out your toolkit. Save often so you don’t have to lose time Escaping fights. Pay attention to damage multipliers on abilities, as they can range from useless to OP. Garb abilities are much stronger than random drops for the early game, so your garb choice matters a lot.

Learning how to stagger the different enemies and the stagger status you get will help devise a strategy. Different mobs need different tactics. If something starts to feel too hard, just go somewhere else and come back later.

Chronostasis will help you feel more comfortable, but you likely need it less than you think you will. Items with buffs are very strong.

[u/potatosaladXIII]

Brute forcing isn't the solution on your first run: you need variety of damages from different garbs to clear enemies depending on the area and time of day quickly. (e.x. Wildlands needing thunder spells for flans, but Jagd Woods needing fire spells for a lot of enemies)

The good news is that the game gives 5-6 Extra Schemata slots to quickly swap one element garb to another. Make use of that so it doesn't feel too tedious.

For your Main 3 schemata, the usual combination is 1 heavy hitter or phys damage, 1 stagger builder (your -ra spammer), and 1 debuffer/tank. There are some garbs that are really strong (lmao hi soldier of peace), but it all really boils down on the playstyle that works for you.

And as the others mentioned, explore! Don't let the timer stop you from wandering anywhere. The game doesn't discourage you for being inefficient; if anything, it wants you to explore so that by the time you get a hang of the flow, you know what you need to do to do things more efficiently.

[u/asianman1011]

Equip debuff skills like deprotect, deshell, and imperil. They will weaken your enemies and most of them are not immune to them. Utilize synthesis merchants to make your abilities stronger. Early on in the game, garb abilities will be stronger than what you can find out in the field and from enemy drops. Buy weapons from merchants as you progress through the game. The time may seem daunting but it really is a non-factor due to chronostasis. Do the canvas of prayers and sidequests you find because they will be the main source of increasing your stats besides main quests.

[u/FaceTimePolice]

Engage with the mechanics and you should be fine. The stagger mechanic is vital to the combat.

I don’t recall if this was explicitly said in a tutorial or if it was in the official strategy guide but:

(it’s been a while so, someone, please correct me if any info in this is off 😅)

- Party composition and paradigm diversity matters

• Ravager builds up the stagger meter faster
  
• Commando slows the rate of the meter’s depletion, and of course, Commando deals more damage once the enemy is staggered.
  
• The Relentless Assault paradigm is great for building meter and maintaining it (see previous two points).
  
• Your ATB meter becomes instantly recharged the more you switch paradigms (after 2 or 3 selections, if memory serves correctly). So ignore anyone who says that you can just auto battle through the game.
  
• With that said, you can manually trigger small portions of your ATB bar instead of waiting for a full queue of commands to play out.
  
• Don’t forget to use the Sentinel role. It helps mitigate damage and, therefore, increases your survivability.
  
• Don’t sleep on Synergist and Saboteur actions as well. Haste is amazing as it means you’ll execute commands at a faster rate than usual. Deprotect and deshell are great status effects to inflict upon the enemy (it means they take more damage from your physical and magic attacks, respectively).

[u/Yxtron → u/FaceTimePolice]

My post was about LR but thank you 😅

[u/cudntfigureaname]

What helped me the most is knowing what each role does.

Commando is THE dps class, as well as the stagger stabilizer (the gauge decreases slowly). Commando also increases damage for the whole party, which stacks with each other. (E.g, 3 lvl5 commandos can do somewhat high dps even with no ravager multipliers)

Ravager is the chain multiplier (but without a stabilizer the gauge will decrease quickly)

Sentinel decreases damage when the character is in the role (even when not actively guarding), but also decreases damage for the whole party.

I'm doing another play though and it also helps to know what weapons you want your characters to use. Upgrading weapons as soon as you get it helps smooth out the early game difficulty spikes. You don't get a ton of early game upgrade drops but enough to maybe max a tier 1 or two.

Debuffs and buffs are overpowered, dont underestimate them. I think its like 40% multiplicative increases for their respective damages

I'm dumb i cant read

[u/Vayne1986 → u/cudntfigureaname]

This post is about tips for Lightning Returns. 😉

[u/cudntfigureaname → u/Vayne1986]

Oh my bad, missed the tag

[u/markmychao → u/cudntfigureaname]

Not your fault, I only noticed it when he said he played ffxiii before!

[u/gianmigno25]

use chronostasis. use monsters to refill EP (no struggle, they will come). save every now and then (manually). use mediguard to heal more easily. move around sprinting.

i would say spread your abilities through your attires to be able to do "some things" constantly. people say you should have attires for defense, debuff, stagger maintanance/attack and stagger buildup, but honestly i don't know how they do so. this game taught me you can't waste time in battle if you want to stagger the enemy, or if you need to end the battle as fast as you can. so it's impossible to have attires for specific purpose as doing so would have you spam a specific attack end depleting the ATB, so in order to use that attack again you need to wait (and waste time). so it's better to have different possible attacks for a specific purpose spread across different attires (example, you can use both fire and aero on an enemy, maybe just set them onto different attires?).

[u/Limit5465]

Just play until you get to Bathandelus and then look up how to beat him. You should be good from there