It's not lost on me how great this game is. I love so much about it, and have managed to get through a good deal of the game twice, but still have yet to beat it.

However, this game severely stresses me out for one reason. I can't quite figure out how frequently I should be going into the dungeon to fight. I feel all this pressure to build my social links and study, but I'm also nervous that I should be going around in the dungeons like every few days. I haven't figured out any way to gauge how frequently I'm supposed to spend time there knowing that there's a lot you miss if you don't handle things right outside...

Is there some kind of general guideline that I missed as far as choosing what to do with my time? I don't like using walkthroughs.

gee, it's like you're going through High School or somethin'

@kamolahy: Go through each dungeon twice. Do it on rainy days and try and do it all in one go so you have more time for s-links.

Just go in when you feel like it.

Getting all of the social links requires insane planning and knowledge of the game beforehand. Or a walkthrough. Don't worry about getting them all, just most. Also, if you don't rescue someone in time the game rewinds you five days, enough time to get a few levels under your belt and fight the boss.

Golden or PS2?

I've learned after playing PE3 that I don't need to do everything in Persona games. You can complete the game without doing that many social links just fine.

If you're feeling up for playing the game a second time, use a guide.

I've been finding luck with completing each dungeon on One go, to only use up the Required amount of time in the dungeon and spend most of it on social links.

and on each dungeon run I usually complete the previous dungeon a second time to get whatever weapon or special item is at the end, but i'm at the final (before the Final final) dungeon and I think i've only gone into the TV like 6 or 7 times.

if you think you'll run out of MP while in there you just gotta hoard your SP items. Grow the SP filling plants, buyout the TaP machine every week, use the Vita's "HELP" thing in the dungeon to restore some hp/mp. I find this strategy to be very satisfying, as I get all the social links I want!

Normally I go the first time I can and then go as far as I can even trying to beat it. If I am not done on the first try I will go the last day possible while maxing out my social stuff the other days. Also After each phase I will go through the previous dungeon as well to get the extra stuff. I try to spend as less in dungeons as possible because I play this game because of the social links and the story XD

@vikingdeath1: Also go and max out the Fox link as fast as possible^^

the only time you should have any problems with this is maybe the first two real dungeons, which require a little bit of planning/knowledge of the game to do in one shot. after that though, if you've been buying taps, getting SP items, and you know the fox, you should have no problems doing a dungeon in one shot.

on this latest playthrough, every time i get to a new dungeon i re-run the old one for quest items and the extra boss, then heal up and do the new dungeon. once you're used to the game you'll have no problems.

but hey, don't worry about trying to do everything fast and metagame your way out of having fun. you can always play the game a different way later.

I've been using a guide for my first playthrough just for social link stuff, but yeah that feeling is basically the game almost perfectly emulating the High School Experience.

"Dang I need to study for midterms but this cute girl I like wants to go to the park right now... fucckkkk..."

The Vita version of the game actually makes it way easy to complete a dungeon in one day.

Go through the new dungeon as far as you can until you SP is low. Leave the dungeon and then instead of going back to the real world, talk to your other party members and go back to their specific dungeons. You should be able to beat the fights there by just rushing normal attacks. Do this to get shuffle times for HP/SP recovery, level up, get cash, and use the Vita's Help function to get HP/SP back every fight. Once you fill your SP back up in the easy dungeon, leave and go back to the story dungeon.

It's grindy, but beating a dungeon in one day is ideal for doing everything else in the game.

Whenever it rains basically. As soon as a dungeon became available I would finish it immediately in one to two days, and then just went in to farm until I got bored whenever it rained after that. Think of most of the rainy days as the games way of telling you that its going to take away social links and reward you for going into the TV that day. You really only have to run through the dungeon twice, once for the first boss and twice for the extra boss, if you want to keep up on levels. Assuming that you're fighting all or most monsters or those hand shadows (if you're on vita) for xp.

Finishing in one day is key is doing everything. Read some guides.

@believer258: Golden. Just realized there was a separate forum for that.

This is just was stressed me out about life mannnnn

Just use a guide, seriously. You'll be able to see all the content that way without a fuss.

Alternatively, you can just play through the game twice like I did, and the second time around all of your stats will already be at max so you can focus solely on the dungeons and social links.