[Multiplatform] Phantasy Star Universe

I told Miles I'd pop back in for this thread, so here I am :P

Finally got home and done with other stuff, popped in the PS2 version, and of course it's down, which I pretty much expected. The weekly maintenance is usually 5 hours on Thursday nights, so if I don't get to play it tonight or tommorrow online (I work during the day) I'm going to be pretty annoyed At least I'm off Fri-Sun with no obligations. Miles, maybe start a character list in the first post with people's character names/versions?

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Kurado

Five hours THURSDAY nights? Lame sauce. Should be like WoW, where it's early in the morning. I just picture more people playing a game during the day and well into the evening.

Maybe the servers are in Japan, so it's more easier their time? Dunno. Normally I wouldn't really mind, just having it the day after the US release (which was largely down the whole day) is crappy timing the first week is all. I still can't get online at all, keeps saying my Sega ID/pass is incorrect, even though I know it's not. Plus I can't even doublecheck it since I'd have to be able to get onto the billing site to confirm my password. Awesome, guess I'm offline until Friday (work). At least gives me time to hopefully finish Yakuza.

Are you getting this Kurado?

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Kurado

I don't really want to run this on my PS2.

Why the hell not? I'm telling you to get it.

I know I'll be making a RAcast, but not sure about a name yet. Do you happen to recall offhand the character limit for names Miles?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Kurado

What the hell is the DNAS?

It's something for security on the Sony side that basically checks to make sure you're not pirating more or less.

Originally Posted by Manny Biggz

You can buy the dual wield sabers in the weapon shop. The icon on the left is two sabers crossed. There's a few other weapons like this. Just look at the icons. The skill for the dual knuckles = boss killer!

Dual wield sabers are the ones that are not crossed. The icon with the two weapons crossed are daggers.

Anyway, woke up a bit early this morning, was able to get on right away no problem. Gotta go to work now, so I probably won't be able to get online again until tommorrow morning.

Name: Daravon
Type: Cast
Class: Ranger
Version: PS2

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by SCHNEE-3

Thanks to my early classes, I managed to get my online account registered and activated before heading to class today since all the kiddies were still asleep/already at school.

Name: Cinnamon Spice
Race: Newman
Class: None yet (Just completed the tutorial), probably going to be Force
Version: PC

FYI your starting class is determined by your race, you don't pick.

On a related note, does anybody know offhand how much meseta it would cost to switch classes at the very start? Kyndig probably wants a Hunter Cast, not a Ranger. IIRC you start off with 0 meseta right? (I'm at work, so I can't check any of this).

I also LOVE the body options with the casts, you can make some cool stuff. I think the body/clothes shops sell things you can't start with as well, looking forward to what I can do. Also looking forward to playing as a cast, since I always played human before.

Most amazing jew boots

Anyone on PC/PS2 right now?

Also:

Quote:

In order to keep the servers operating at the fullest of their potential, a weekly maintenance period will be performed across all game versions. Maintenance is schedule for the following time:

* TONIGHT: October 26-27, 11pm to 4am PDT (GMT-7)

Yes, I know that makes no sense since PDT is GMT-8, blame Sega. So depending on which is correct, the servers will be going down for 5 hours either in about 3 hrs 45 mins, or in 2 hrs 45 mins.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I can try to meet up with you, where you at?

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Para

sailor and i got raped by the dragon lol...

Yeah, that was bad. What sucks is I was actually doing good damage w/1st person shooter mode since I'm ranger (I was getting all headshots nonstop), but I had no healing items It would've been sad, but if I had had some monomates I probably could have pulled it off, it would've just taken a while. I think I finally have 2000 meseta so I can buy a good weapon, I was doing shit damage with my guns in that level.

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

Originally Posted by SCHWARZE-5

K, just got the game downloaded and installed. Will pay for a hunter's license tomorrow, so I hope to meet a few of you on. I will go by BIGWORM of course. Question about online: When you die, do you lose your Meseta and your currently equipped weapon? That was a drag in PSO/v2...especially online.

I think it just hurts your mission rank. I died on the dragon last night, and I don't THINK I lost anything.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I'm on right now (PS2), I just have to do something real quick here and take a quick shower, I'll be back on in like 20 or so minutes if anyone wants to hook up.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Dang Miles, I musta just missed you. I went to bed at 2am my time and you weren't on. Also what mission is that crazy robot thing? I haven't done that one yet

Anyway I'll be on most of today barring anything coming up, so drop me a line if you need somebody. I'm currently lvl 15 RAcast.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Finally got my full set of awesome cast parts :P



I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by Lacerta

what level are you now ;_;

35. I only went up two levels (?) yesterday, you were too busy milking my solo runs :P

I was speaking idiomatically.

Nice, like it.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

Originally Posted by Lacerta

Well I'm not trying to level, it just comes with the money and tech grinding.

Same here.

Also Uzuki I've only seen you on like once . I've been kinda helping the others level a bit. Once you hit 21 or 22 or so you can do what we're doing. I'm the highest, most of the others are low/mid 20s, it's not a huge discrepancy.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Para

lol I know!! Daravon was about the same level as I but he's been grinding faster than me lol.

You spend a lot of time synthing and so on, much more than I find to be necessary, at least at the moment :P

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

I'm selling a [B] Midiline. It's a six star armor board, extremely rare. It's in my shop for 32,000, only other shop I've ever seen it in currently has it for 50,000, and I saw one made one disappear at 150,000 (dunno if it sold or what though). If anyone here buys it I'll knock it down to 30,000 or refund you the 2,000 if you've already bought it.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

I've got a lvl 43 ranger, and they kick ass. With dual handguns I have 0 problems tagging everything, even with I play with lvl 50 people. And the whole time I'm pelting enemies, which is distracting them from the Hunters/Forces, getting them to come after me, and most of the time shocking or freezing them with fair consistency. Our damage kinda sucks though (as a cast. Any other race would probably do horrible damage), but we're an excellent support class. Mad status effects and range, and it's easy to lure enemies to you so they're not going after other people, and so the hunters can hit them in the back. PP's also not an issue, even on a rank runs I never run out of guns.

Also factor in that you're hitting WAY more than anyone else since you fire faster and generally have to move far less (if it all), you're doing less damage per shot, but you're getting way more shots in. You fire much faster than a force, and you don't have to worry about repositioning yourself like a Hunter. All the classes have pros/cons, but if you think Rangers suck, you're playing them wrong, go back to Hunter.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Yeah, 70 doesn't seem right, unless you're using weak weapons that are strong with the element of the enemy you're fighting? At high levels I do maybe about half? of the dmage a hunter at my level does, but I'm hitting more and causing status effects. Plus Rangers excel at most of the boss fights (me and 3 other rangers at my level took down De Ragan on A rank in less than a minute). You'll never cause the pure damage of a Hunter or Force though. It sounds like you're thinking like a Hunter and looking for pure damage, it doesn't work that way. Rangers are very useful but you have to totally change your mindset. And you should never, EVER be using your saber except for the rhinos in the Relics.

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Lacerta

I wonder which is better anyway, Saber or Dagger?

The only thing I really like about the dagger PA is that it hits 4 times and smacks almost every weakpoint on the enemy. I was able to hit 4 of Syvaltus' weakpoints with it for crazy damage.

Then he swung the sword and made me cry. But still, crazy damage!

I've never messed with other one handed ranger weapons. I actually totally forgot they could equip single daggers :P

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by Lukage

Well, for a character who bought it at level 15, it sure as hell was pretty high-grade for my pockets. 8600 meseta isn't easy to come by when I'm the farthest one away from all the loot to get.

Are you playing finders keepers games? Any Ranger, Force, and most Hunters worth their salt will not play those games, for that exact reason. Even at lower levels you should be clearing about 1000 profit on any Parum/Neudaiz run, if not more, assuming you s-rank it. Unless you're in a crappy party, or you keep joining finders games, you shouldn't be having this problem. At higher ranks (B and A) I usually clear 2k or so on Parum runs, and 2500k on Neudaiz runs.

FINDERS GAMES = BAD

Originally Posted by Lacerta

Well, I don't know what to say to that honestly.

Something is amiss~!

Also about grinding. It appears that the Yohmei weapons have two breakpoints. One at +4 ~ +5, and another at +10. If you are rich and have backups it is suggested to get any Yohmei's to +5 because (most of the time) the ATP they gain will double what they started with, and it doesn't take rocket science to see that is a good thing.

If you don't like grinding that high, even on your max luck days (hey, I've had something break when they said it wouldn't break on the first upgrade), GRM is the safe choice, although I don't know when they get their good breakpoint, but with their already somewhat high stats a few low grinds will make them good.

I feel you on the meseta issues, sometimes you just gotta solo a billion times to get what you need.

Now if only it didn't cost an arm and a leg (sort of) to get 5* weapons.

GRM weapons get their major boosts the first two grinds (+1/2), and the last two grinds (+9/10). Youmei gets their major boosts in the middle (+4/5). I've seen several comparisons with a Youmei +5 gun and a GRM +5 gun where the Youmei had the same ATP or slightly higher, but with way higher ATA and PP (especially PP). Basically if you're not planning on grinding all the way (which I consider insanity myself), a Youmei +5 is going to do you way better than anything else.

Originally Posted by Lacerta

You. Suck. ;_;

As a Ranger you should never be doing melee except on the rhinos and maybe the worms. If you're melee'ing as Ranger other than that, something's gone horribly wrong. I've never bothered with Dagger since I've only switched to my saber maybe 5-10 times in 145 hours :P. Still planning on going with an Earth bulb though.

I was speaking idiomatically.

Originally Posted by Lukage

Unfortunately 15 minute boss runs with a group yield better cash. Just praying I find a shotgun some time soon so I can join in on the XP fun.

As far as the looting, that's for the items. All the "good" stuff I find are just boards for food and the occasional Kubara Wood. I'm not a high enough level to do the B's yet, so I'll have to stick with about 700 per run. You're assuming I pick up meseta 6 times.

I'm still confused how you're not tagging enemies before they're getting killed honestly. Also, you realize meseta drops are counted as normal items for distribution, they're not finders keepers on random/set in order games right?

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

I'm just going to copy/paste this from PSOW explaining what dates we'll most likely get updates, based on the fact that they've said we'll get updates at the length of time after release that Japan got them. We MAY get these slightly earlier because Japan had that beta thing for a month, it's totally unknown if they're going to account for that time or not. These timeframes below assume that we wait the full 6 weeks for the first update like Japan did.

Quote:

On 2006-11-08 09:39, AeraLure wrote:
Yeah its very easy to figure out the US release dates. Just take the JP ones and change the dates accordingly. In fact, I'll post the JP version update release schedule with the approximate US dates in parenthesis (adjusted 2 days to land on a Thursday). These are estimates and they may shift one week forward or back depending on what SEGA does, but this will be awful close to what we get, since it has been already stated that they will follow the JP release pretty closely:

PSU JP released: 31st AUGUST 2006 (US 24th October 2006)

Phantasy Star Universe was released in Japan, for PS2 and PC platforms.


PSU JP Content updates:

5th OCTOBER 2006 (US 30th November 2006)

* Opening of Moatoob
* 6 new missions added for:
o Parum
o Neudaiz
o Moatoob
* Adjustment to Mission parameters and Completion Bonuses

12th OCTOBER 2006 (US 7th December 2006)

* Online Story Mission with Leia Martinez added (episode 2-1)
* 2 new S-Rank missions added:
o "Retake the Plant" (Linear Line)
o "The Damaged Communications Thoroughfare" (Guardians' Colony)
* Maximum level cap changed from 50 to 60
* Expert classes unlocked (7 in total)
* Photon arts level increased to 30
* 8 New Weapon Types Added:
o Double Saber
o Axe
o Twin Claw
o Single handed Claw
o Grenade Launcher
o Laser Cannon
o Crossbow
o Cards
* 2 New SUV weapons added
* New armours, weapons, and clothing/parts added.
* Partner Machinery re-initialisation Kit added
* New Technics and Photon Arts added.


19th OCTOBER 2006 (US 14th December 2006 - note: we will likely get Christmas here instead)

* Halloween theme added: (October 19th to November 9th)
o Halloween decorations for certain areas
o Hallo Rappies
o Halloween room theme available for 5000 meseta.
* 1 new S-rank mission added:
o "Retake the Sanctuary" (Agata relics)

26th OCTOBER 2006 (US 21st December 2006)

* Online Story Mission with Leia Martinez added (episode 2-2)
* 1 new S-rank mission added:
o Hakura Temple

7th NOVEMBER 2006 (US 5th January 2007)

* Online Story Mission with Leia Martinez (episode 2-3)
* 6 new S-rank missions for:
o Parum (2 missions)
o Neudaiz (2 missions)
o Moatoob (2 missions)
* New level cap
* New weapons/armours
* New Photon Arts
* New my room goods
* New clothes/parts
* New SUV's

And this is the more detailed description of the Nov 7th update for Japan, repasted here from the OP's post:

Story mission:
Episode 2-3 - HIVE mission with Hyuuga

NEW feature! Party mission:
Bruce's Dungeon
@ Guardian's HQ on Moatoob
2-5 players required.

Srank missions:

Parum:
Endrum Plant
Labs

Neudaiz:
Mizuraki 1
(At the time, there was a problem with shikon archipaelago mission , so they will add it next time)

Moatoob:

Galenigare Canyon 1/2


Level cap - 60->70

6 new photon arts!
Spinning Break - Sword
Gravity Dance - Double Saber
Moubuseirenzan - Twin dagger
Darkness Shot - Guns
Damubarta
Defbal

New rank weapon/armor/boards
2 new SUVs

New clothes/parts for all races

New My Room reform tickets!

FELIPE NO

The admin on the PSU boards said updates were 2-3 weeks away from NOW, not from release guys...which makes what I posted pretty much accurate. Sorry, missed that before.

How ya doing, buddy?

He said that YESTERDAY. Meaning 2-3 weeks from YESTERDAY. Which matches up with about the 30th, which matches with what I posted. I'll see if I can find the exact post again, Sega's boards are a mess.

Edit: He's apparently edited his posted, since it now says to look for updates "soon." He also states we can use the JP->US/EU time delay as a guide, but it's not set in stone that if JP gets an update after 6 weeks, we'll get it after 6 weeks. We'll have to see when we get the first update to find out for sure. SUPPOSEDLY they're waiting for the game to come out in Europe, then release whatever patches at that point and keep US and EU at the exact same point, as opposed to doing JP, then US, the EU seperately. He says that's EU will be on the same servers, and that it's incorrect that they will be seperate. If the US gets dicked on updates because we're waiting for the European release, I will be pissed off at that point.

Jam it back in, in the dark.