Video game lessons learned the hard way

@NES:

You want those skeletons around spooking your dwarves. Just find a good dumping ground to use. A dwarf who gets spooked enough will stop being spooked by other things too.

Persona 3 Portable: Armageddon is the one-hit-kill fusion spell, not Last Judge.

Also, don't try to fight the Reaper with an elemental weakness, whether on a party member or yourself. Especially yourself.

Hyrule Warriors: If you go into Adventure Mode missions trying to get the silver drop from Giant Bosses, you will have a rash of gold drops and weapon drops. This is doubly true if you're looking to get The Imprisoned's Scales.

Don't Starve:

• If you're quick, you generally can avoid getting stung by the bees when harvesting their bee boxes.
• Mauling a spider nest that's level three? Might be a good idea to have some traps to deal with troublesome spider warriors.
• Just remember, just because you are whacking at an empty level three spider nest, does not mean the nest won't turn into a queen to defend herself. Be ready to run at a moment's notice!

Starbound

• There's not a lot of technique involved in finding the items for the late chain "find item X from civilization structure Y" quests, as it's almost all RNG determining what spawns where. Even extremely dangerous ice climates or completely irradiated planets will spawn mundane clothing/food/whatever salesmen/women who have zero issue hanging around outside. Stop trying to find patterns and just land on every 'habitable planet' in the system until the things finally spawn.

Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze: Learn to stay calm when hopping from barrel to barrel. The game loves toying with your reflexes when there are surrounding hazards.

Dark Souls:

• Physical attack-blocking shield is your best friend. While you might need others for specific enemies or bosses, a simple Heater Shield can carry you places.
  • Crest Shield is a solid contender for a universal shield.
• Drop down your guard in-between enemy attacks. Your stamina goes way faster up that way and against some enemies having a block up is crucial.
• Crossbows sadly suck, since you can't manually aim them.
• Fat-rolling is something you probably don't want to do, unless you can afford taking a hit.
  • Because of that, get Havel's Ring ASAP if you want to wear any decent medium-heavy armors.
• Just because you're not staggered doesn't mean you don't take lots of damage.
• Crystal Caves can go eat a bunch of d**ks.

edited 4th Feb '15 4:38:26 PM by FergardStratoavis

Crossbows are generally good for PVP, since they're instant ranged damage with little investment, and can be "aimed" with some quick fingers

I suppose so, if you could just roll after shooting it once. But since you have to reload it before being able to do a thing, I'm not too convinced.

Mind you, I was writing this more for PVE than PVP. I suck at the latter no matter what.

Yeh.

bows are a cheesing method most of the time. Hardly any damage, but the AI is dumb

Dragonslayer Greatbow, ftw.

Final Fantasy XIV: If you're afflicted with Heat Wave (a debuff that causes you to take damage whenever you move or perform any kind of action), don't try to be funny and /mandervilledance while you wait for it to go away. Apparently, dancing counts for this. Who knew?

Dominions 4:

• You need more dudes. Whether it is by recruitment, mercenaries or summoning, always find ways to get more dudes.
• Fortresses are not just for chokepoints or throne provinces. They are for pretty much every place where you can find a good amount of resources. Gold is cheap, resources are what really limits your ability to get more dudes.
• When designing a pretender: Good scales, good blessings, good magic variety, pick two.
• Have a plan. Don't just flail around at random trying to brute-force yourself to victory. Always have a plan of sorts.
• Try to efficiently search your entire empire for magic sites. You need gems, because more gems means more dudes.
• Expensive dudes are not always efficient dudes.
• Magic can be a big boon during battles.
• Spread your dominion. Failing that, at least entrench your dominion so that it won't get pushed back.
• Blood magic requires a lot of busywork. Make sure you know what you want out of it before dipping in.
• Corpse Men are cheap, available and have a decent amount of hitpoints to put between your enemy and your archers/mages. What they don't have is any kind of staying power, so don't expect them to come out of the fight in one piece. Or at all. Seriously, those hitpoints are made out of tissue paper.
• Tactics matter. Always arrange your dudes before battle. The default blob isn't much good for anything but a minor morale bonus. (or lack of penalty, whatever)
• Script your pretender's battle plan. Otherwise, your unarmed and unarmoured magic pretender will run straight into the fray for no reason and die to two basic spearmen.
• A plan that requires infinite time and gems is a bad plan.
• Kitting out a thug can be as easy as putting a weightless tower shield on an Eagle King.
• Thugs are only good for taking out lots of basic enemy dudes for cheap. Don't send them against armies with magic/priest support. Especially not if your thug happens to be a demon.
• There are many ways to protect yourself from regular damage. Magic damage, on the other hand, is a bit more difficult to prevent. Anti-magic amulets for your thugs are always a good investment, if rather flimsy.
• Do not take unnecessary risks with your pretender. The last thing you need is for him to die and come back feebleminded.
• Your dudes are not friendly fire proof. If your battle plan involves loads of archers and lightly armoured infantry, there better well be some Arrow Fend or any protection from physical damage in there.
• A strategy counting on "more dudes" better include supply-giving items. Or undead. Whichever works.
• Some pretenders can not move. This is not as much a problem as it would seem, since you can still teleport by magic, and it keeps you from doing something too stupid. Well, apart from accidentally picking an unmoveable pretender, I suppose.
• I suck at this game, and should seriously consider dialling the AI back to Easy.
• Take frequent brakes to replenish the patience required for all the micromanagement.

Battlefield: Hardline (Beta)

• This game is much, much more fast-paced and speed oriented than your typical Battlefield game. In fact if you have the sidearm equipped instead of the primary weapon, you'll sprint even faster than normal. Do keep in mind though that the pistol and most of the other sidearms are NOT the optimal weapon to win engagements with.
• You might want to be extra careful when standing out in the open this time, since you never know whether your enemy is planning to shoot you or simply drive over you instead.
• Illogical as it sounds, you've still got a parachute no matter what class you are - remember to use it when falling, dammit!
• Don't rely upon the game's automated squad setup - join a near-full strength squad instead. No point running around with a single mechanic who's more interested in driving around in his muscle car aimlessly, spawning you frequently at the edge of the map.
• The vehicles, bikes and AT Vs included, are very stiff and difficult to flip over when driving. Thus you don't have to worry about stuff like power-sliding, the emergency brakes, handling, ground traction, etc. This doesn't mean it's impossible to get stuck in a ditch or pinched into an alleyway, however. This is especially important to remember when driving the Police Command Vehicle, because that sucker is big, boxy, and can get easily trapped in the terrain.

Dynasty Warriors 7:

• They weren't joking about Lu Bu.

Starbound

• The first boss was broken by one of the recent patches. Despite the fact that no beam graphics appear, it deals constant damage on the left and right during phase 3—enough to kill an end game character in about five seconds. Good luck if the characters is in the actual tier of gear that's considered appropriate to the mission (hint: instagib).

All Dynasty Warriors games (except for the fighting game one):

1. Don't pursue Lu Bu.
2. Don't kill Diaochan.
3. Don't pursue Lu Bu after killing Diaochan.

edited 9th Feb '15 4:48:30 PM by WillyFourEyes

Hyrule Warriors:

• During "Kill X enemies in 10 minutes" levels, you just don't have time to kill the giant bosses that come after you. This is technically a Dynasty Warriors game, so treat them like you would Lu Bu - an obstacle that chases you - and ignore them as best you can.

SSB4:

• You will not beat anyone online, especially in For Glory, until you can defeat a level 9 opponent on a consistent basis. Level 9 may have inhuman reflexes, but Level 8 is still nowhere near the level of brutality you will encounter in competitive play.
• Basically? Unless you can name ten current advanced metagaming techniques or bits of jargon off the top of your head and until you can identify the exact frame of each meteor smash, give up. Seriously. Your record of wins to losses is so imbalanced, Glass Joe is shaking his head in shame.
• Also, pick a main and stick with them. Jack of all trades, master of none, remember. Plus you'll just end up fighting Little Mac with Donkey Kong at some point.

edited 10th Feb '15 5:56:03 PM by Midna

Just make sure if the boss in particular is Gohma, do not let it get a morale boost.

That probably applies to the Imprisoned as well, now that I think about it...

The boss that inspired that revelation was Manhandla. After I lost on time because I'd burned five minutes trying to kill one, I decided to ignore it entirely and focus on the Enemy Playables. Got out with about a minute to spare.

Taking out Enemy Playables is the main focus when I do those levels, so morale boosts shouldn't be a risk.

And yet, when you get to kill 1000 in 10 minutes, you don't even have the time to go for the playables, you have so much killing to do.

Retropixel Castles:

Towers are a good offensive defense, but it takes a lot to build and run them. You might want to find a good place to wall in first, THEN build them.

One that I learned specifically from Hyrule Warriors but is applicable to a horde of games:

When a patch for gameplay goes through, you'll have to relearn how to do your old tricks in the game. Even if the ability in question is buffed, they may have changed the precise input needed to perform the move.

My example is Zant in Hyrule Warriors in the 1.5 patch. They improved his range and power, but his C4 finish (with the Energy Ball finisher now requiring a light attack at the end of the string instead of either the light attack or the dodge button) is now functionally different. In some ways better, but I wasn't ready for the button changes.

Monaco

• The guards don't actually care that much much about each other and will happily friendly fire ten of their own if it means that rocket will hit a player.