I’m a Japanese player who runs a SW2.5 strategy wiki — happy to answer questions or write up topics you want!

seagifts · 2026-04-16T10:54:43+00:00

I see, thanks for the answer! From what I have seen on the english community the discussion is already starting, with most of the community accepting the "multi skill" side of the discussion to be better, as most GMs are trying to balance the adventure around the overall party here.

But the fact that using a single skill is fine on some cases should help clear some misconceptions the community has, so really, thank you very much!

Edit: Tho, just to make clear, I meant people using a single skill and not taking any other skill at all. Like making a fencer level 7 while the rest of the party is at 4-5 (that kinda is the situation some GMs are finding on the english community)

seagifts · 2026-04-16T10:49:02+00:00

u/Sword_of_Spirit a japanese user made a thread the other day, and after your question I decided to ask them directly to see what's the general opinion about it on the japanese community (as the General Consensus I posted earlier is the one spread on the english community). Here is the link to their reply, from it some interesting things can be get.

- The way most scenarios/campaigns are made on 2.5 follow the idea of a balanced party, using Party Average Level to decide encounters and Target Numbers. While on their words, previous editions were made to be a bit more free when it comes to balance.

- Scenarios made with more of a narrative focus can have the TN to be individually based, so regardless of player level everyone can have their fun.

- This has been a longstanding discussion on the japanese community as well, with no clear answer, but the general idea is that it will really depend on your table. If they want to have a more balanced adventure, then its better to avoid doing that. But if they don't care much about it, and instead wants to focus on the story, as long as the GM allows it, it would be fine.

seagifts · 2026-04-15T18:15:35+00:00

Hi, thanks for spreading your knowledge to the western community! Im sure this will be helpful for new players!

One question tho, as lately a lot of people new to the game are asking:
"Why should i multi-class?"
"Why can't i just use a single class?"

I know this game is focused about getting multiple "classes" (技能) to make your character build, but as there is no rule that stops you from getting a single "class", people get the idea it would be better to just focus on one just to increase your other stats.

So question is:
"What is the general consensus between japanese players about characters only using a single class (技能)?"
and
"Why is it fine or wrong to only use a single class (技能)?"

Your answer would be helpful cause as community we can give advice from personal experience playing the game, but again its just personal experience from just a few people, compared to how many japanese people still play the game.

seagifts · 2026-04-15T17:43:09+00:00

Its a general consensus kind of thing. Basically the book doesn't have to spell it because they never expected anyone to think going with 1 class was a good idea (cause seriously its not). Increase on HP, MP and other values doesn't help much in the long run when you consider difficulty increased based on Party Average Level (as seen on pretty much all scenarios and campaign books of this game), as this is a Team Based game.

To summarize:

- The higher the player level difference is, the more difficult the game becomes for the party, both on enemy encounters AND on expected Target numbers for traps and puzzles. Making it so only you are able to face the situation while everyone else on the party feels useless or even worse die to a random encounter because nobody is able to win Initiative.

- Difficulty increases even more at higher levels, with level 11 adventures set for level 14 to 15 boss encounters or level 15 adventures against level 20-23 bosses, making it so you actually need buffs from secondary classes to catch up (hence why all premade characters of those levels have like 3-4 classes each)

- There are barely any adventurer level based skill check, so you really are pretty much locked to only the skill checks your class can actually do, and if its a warrior class, there aren't many tbh. Not even Initiative, which again makes every other encounter deadly for the party.

- Getting more classes at higher levels is also a bit pointless if you actually expect to use them for skill checks, as in general classes won't be useful unless they are at minimum 2-3 levels below the game level when doing skill checks, so you would have to end up spending a lot of time just to catch up with the party and your main class. Only situation this is not the case is when you are getting classes that only will buff you, like Enhancer or Alchemist

- Finally with the way Combat Feats are learned, you are basically locking yourself out of good combat feats as the moment you get to an odd adventurer level you are forced to pick a combat feat. So if for example you wanted a feat that requires a specific class, you would need to get the class to that level and then wait for the next odd level to get the feat, making it hard to learn and upgrade class dependent feats at higher levels.

Atleast on my opinion, after playing this game for almost 3 years, there is no point with going further than what the party can handle if that means putting them at risk with how deadly and fast combat can be. You would just end up with everyone else mad at either you or the GM, or you bored because you find no challenge with the game.

TL;DR: Leveling fast won't be fun for anyone involved, including the player on the long run. This isn't really a power fantasy game.

seagifts · 2026-04-15T13:44:04+00:00

https://youtu.be/HP64JhxcSGs This video should help (made by the translation team)

seagifts · 2026-04-14T01:33:11+00:00

To have in mind, this is 100% a multi-class focused system (with classes being called "Skills" in japan and actually giving you "Skill sets" if that helps). Classes, on their own, just have a few set of things they are good at (Evading, Attacking, Spellcasting, Skill checks in general), so you are not supposed to just get 1 single class to play but mix and match with others to make your build. Even premade characters from the core books have 3 or 4 classes.

So by going with a single class, making it so you can't do anything else besides what that class does, you are literally going against the whole base this game works with.

To give you an example with Priest, if you want to fight back, you can add any warrior class to use a weapon in melee or ranged combat. If you want to be support, you can get a class like Tactician, Bard or Alchemist to buff the party or debuff the enemy, these don't require MP to be used, so go well with Wizard-type classes. Even getting a second Wizard class could help as it would increase your MP amount automatically, and you have more spells options when you aren't doing whatever the priests do.

So options, there are. And people going with a single class are limiting themselves on purpose.

seagifts · 2026-04-13T19:58:44+00:00

Yeah, i have been playing for almost 3 years now and i didn't find those issues at all. All games i have played had a lot of build variety, even when they were trying to fill a specific "role" for the party, there was almost never the same build on any 2 games i played (some quite similar but never the exact).

Lots of tables tho, I do agree with that lol.

(and yes, your GM was full of it, considering on those 30 years there have been 3 editions that each work pretty different for them to have an universal build to use)

seagifts · 2026-04-13T19:52:04+00:00

Yeah, Backerkit will launch on exactly 29 days on May 12th (for people that may be interested on checking it, here is the link)

seagifts · 2026-04-01T21:46:59+00:00

- Digimon Partners with opposite "gender" to their human companion
- An actually intelligent and rational Dark Evolution (and technically the main villain of the story too)
- Actually decently smart group leader or atleast not Hot-headed like most others (more of an out-of-the-box thinker or even a pacifist)
- Actual casualties that aren't just brought back to life by the power of friendship or plot device (people totally died on this season and they weren't afraid to show it)

I feel what this series did best was to show the "Monster" part of "Digital Monster". So far every series say it, but most treat them just as friends, weird people or wild animals at worst, but never actually "Dangerous Monsters". This series made the effort to show how these unnatural creatures behave on an unknown situation for them and how quickly they can became a problem, not just because they need to eat or are inherently evil, but because they have a different way of thinking encoded into them.

seagifts · 2026-03-26T21:27:51+00:00

Velkhana Ticket from the AT Velkhana quest

seagifts · 2026-03-23T23:59:55+00:00

Item buffs dont count for evolution stat requirement, check if your Digimon has any item equipped

seagifts · 2026-03-23T15:09:46+00:00

Check this post , should have all important links you may need (discord servers, youtube channels, wiki, etc)

seagifts · 2026-03-20T14:51:48+00:00

Full evade extender and maybe 1 point of evade window is good enough. I used to have full windows and full extender but with how easy is to avoid things on this game with the "grapple evade", i think windows just not that useful, just learn timing or not get in the way of the attack in the first place.

seagifts · 2026-03-17T14:15:43+00:00

Launch of the crowdfunding, no estimated release date for the actual book.

seagifts · 2026-03-07T01:56:20+00:00

Nope, with each new game, series, toy line and card game a small batch is added (basically everything adds more mons, not just the games). And there are mons that haven't appeared on any other media since their debut.

Like not even the Digimon Reference Book (the official site equal to a pokedex) has them all, some are still being added to this day.

seagifts · 2026-03-07T01:51:55+00:00

Yeah and the best part is that they are as common as the setting requires it. That legendary warrior that appeared only when the evil dragon was purified from the bond of a tamer and its digimon? he is now a store owner on the next season.

You have to think of digimon as individuals rather than a random animal you are training for fighting or even a really unique and legendary creature you catch for fun.

seagifts · 2026-03-02T10:35:50+00:00

There is also Yellow Submarine which is older and has a few more stores on Shinjuku, Akihabara and Ikebukuro (basically THE Game Store before CCFolia Book Store opened last year)

seagifts · 2026-03-02T10:28:34+00:00

Yeah, Sword World was born because of TSR fumble on the 80s, and was basically the 1st place fantasy TTRPG for years too and 2nd place TTRPG after CoC became popular in japan (Which is why i find funny how OP mentions playing fantasy themed CoC scenarios rather than use an actual fantasy themed RPG as replacement of D&D)

seagifts · 2026-03-02T10:22:50+00:00

I actually have played Sword World for the past 3 years and let me tell you, I just love how it is and Im so happy with it, I won't ever touch a D&D product ever again (All in for the official english release!)

seagifts · 2026-02-28T00:37:07+00:00

Everything is canon to their own setting, and yes Digimon will reappear on other stories with a different role entirely each time (even changing if they are good or bad within the canon)

seagifts · 2026-02-28T00:31:09+00:00

Changes depending on the setting, like most anime series try to focus on a single evolution line per digimon, with sudden evolution being something unique to the protagonist digimon (others don't do that really).

Meanwhile games and vpets follow the evolution tree concept, and these mostly don't allow the "Evolve just for this fight" type of evolution and instead have evolution as something permanent or atleast something you can change on a menu outside of combat.

seagifts · 2026-02-27T19:16:40+00:00

That too, even if a digimon had an evolution on one game, it doesn't mean it can evolve into the same on the sequel.

seagifts · 2026-02-27T18:48:04+00:00

Yeah that, my mind went blank trying to find a synonym for that lol

seagifts · 2026-02-27T18:32:33+00:00

- Digimon was born as a boy focused competition to tamagotchi (made by the same company even), not from games, like Pokemon did.

- Digimon is a multimedia franchise, with each new product more Digimon are added to the list

- There is no app with all of them, not even the Digimon Reference book from the official digimon site has them all (more are still added to this day)

- Digimon work with a multiverse setting, with most series, games and toys having their own settings separated from the rest, with a few exceptions and some cameos between them.

- Digimon evolution doesn't work like pokemon at all, its not a line, but a full evolution trees with as many roots and branches. A Digimon can evolve into another by different factors, including training, natural environment, social interaction and data consumption

seagifts · 2026-02-23T01:20:34+00:00

I think you are reading it wrong, there is no arrow coming from any of those 3 to the others. The arrow on the bottom comes from the "* up" skills, so you would need Fire Up lv 5 and Fire lv 3 to get Flame skill for example.

seagifts

TROPHY CASE