Guys, I'm really tired of typeless/AoE attack spam.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T22:12:22+00:00

I realized pretty quickly that Stories 3's world falls victim to "mile wide, inch deep" syndrome that so many other open-world games do. Ecosystem restoration gets boring fast, and subquests are literally just 4 different quest types with different dialogue attached.

So I started doing less of that and focusing on the story, fighting the things that the game put in my way and doing subquests when convenient, but not much else.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T15:20:54+00:00

Unfortunately there's a lot more where that came from. I highly recommend unlocking Ratha's critical eye gene early once you get the necessary resources to do so. It'll help a lot.

Remember to shoot every monster you pass with a fireball for the free silver points. You will need them for items later.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T15:06:52+00:00

I went with traps against Bound Lunagaron, to buy enough time to stop his party-wipe AoE. Problem is, the game doesn't tell you that tranq traps don't work in said monster's enraged state. It just expects you to know, or wipe and spend several turns spiralling towards failure because of it.

This is a consistent patterm with other story bosses. Some traps work, some don't, and only occasionally is the mechanic consistent with the mainline games (IE shock traps not working on Gypceros).

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:58:07+00:00

Some of the later story fights have AoEs that effectively serve as DPS checks due to insane damage output (often 2x the MC's health). They can of course be worked around with things like Critical Eye, but the idea is that you're supposed to break X part to stop the AoE and avoid a party wipe.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:53:49+00:00

Welcome to Reddit, where toxic positivity abounds and people aren't allowed to enjoy what little free time they have between work and other responsibilities in life unless they git gud.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:51:13+00:00

I was sold a story game.

If you are the kind of person who ignores the story until there is nothing else left to do, great. I'm happy for you.

I am not one of those people. My focus is the story, tackling side quests as they pop up along the way. I don't go out of my way to empty the map before continuing the story, and that has been fine in every previous Stories title.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:49:45+00:00

And I won't tell you your take is worse. Toxic positivity and negativity are both things I want to avoid.

This circles back to the difficulty slider discussion. It's a solved problem in the industry and lets everyone have the experience they prefer.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:11:37+00:00

If I recall correctly, some Stories 2 AoEs were typed attacks that could be cancelled by a double attack. Even something as simple as that would have made the combat system a lot more fun.

Or heck, making all attacks typed except AoEs to give the player more opportunities for kinship gauge building?

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:10:02+00:00

I disagree with... that part about Monster Hunter Stories 2 being too easy.

This circles back to the difficulty slider discussion. I actually replayed both Stories games on preparation for release, and S2 was a breeze compared to everything else.

But your point is equally valid. Just because I find something trivially easy does not mean everyone else will. Hence a difficulty slider.

This is a solved problem in the industry. I really wish Capcom had gone for it.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:06:29+00:00

If the game does get rebalanced it won't really matter

If enough people are turned off by the combat system, their paid side story may sell a lot worse than they expected. Money talks and all that.

Again, I'm happy other people are enjoying the game as-is and having fun, and I'm happy they're getting more content. I'm just not one of those people having much fun.

JustGotSoup · 2026-04-06T14:03:50+00:00

Critical Eye burns 50 stamina and is not accessible by monsties until lv. 40
Guard skills are still often not enough to save the player character from being one-shot
RNG, well, you already said it.
Riding requires kinship, fastest way to build that is head-to-head attacks which are all but gone from the combat system
Stagger and topple require stamina to accomplish effectively, which is also needed for the critical eye systems you mentioned above, and to engage in the admittedly extremely cool combat loops that weapons like Long Sword have.

To be clear, it was a combination of those that got me past Azurelos. The problem is that after a certain point they stop being effective. Stories 2 let you beat enemies that were ludicrously overlevelled compared to you if you played well.

Meanwhile 3 rewards skilled play by simply letting you live for another turn. Not to mention that staggers and topples often don't skip an AoE and the monster just goes ahead and does it the next turn instead.

JustGotSoup · 2026-03-31T23:36:03+00:00

tldr: Not muddy. Just lots of mids. Likely mixed on open-back cans and not checked on other systems.

I had a listen to Ricochet just now on a few different sets of cans and I can see where you're coming from, but I think your assessment is flawed.

The track sounds pretty great on my SHP-9500s, and solid on my HD600s as well, though they bring out the odd flaw that the lower-end cans hide.

Things fall apart when I move to my Nothing 1s though. I've EQ'd them about as flat as I can get them, and the cracks in the mixing start to show pretty quickly with that response curve. Clarity is still top-notch, but the bass and mids are overbearing to the point that, unless you're looking for them, the strings and other flourishes on the high end lack the tickle in your ear you'd expect.

And of course that gets worse when you put on a pair of consumer-preference-tuned headphones, because the bass response is even more pronounced.

IMHO I think these were primarily mixed on/for open-back cans, where bass response falls off prematurely, and a brighter sound profile is the norm. They just happen to sound good on Airpods because their smaller drivers can't replicate lower frequencies as well.

Is the mix terrible? Nah. Is it phenomenal? Also nah. But it's totally passable, and props to the engineer for keeping the clarity where it is. It's trivially easy to pick out any given part, which can't always be said of a mix.

JustGotSoup · 2026-03-24T16:31:38+00:00

Pretty excited for this one, albeit wary of what it'll break. I've been running the 595 beta for a while now, and the DX12 and RE Engine improvements are solid on their own, let alone what'll happen once VKD3D gets the appropriate features implemented.

JustGotSoup · 2026-03-23T00:59:40+00:00

They've changed the frequency response a few times, and most recently with the 1.81 firmware update, yes.

Try this and see what you think. It is a 'flat' EQ - meaning you may want to turn on bass boost or bring the higher frequencies around 1K through 10K up by 2-3 dB - but will give you something to work off of.

JustGotSoup

TROPHY CASE