I'm still pretty early on in the game but can anyone explain this fighting system to me?

I've been fairing pretty well with Pyra and a Tank Blade but I feel like I'm missing something about this fighting system. Sometimes I can take on higher level opponents and other times I can barely beat enemies that are 1-2 levels lower than me.

I feel like I'm missing something very fundamental about this system.

You'll get a full party of three soon, then the levels started to be accurate IMO. The game is definitely built with that in mind. But you need to strike from the sides and back, and as Rex, you need to use blades other than Pyra also. Switching blades allows you to cast more special moves.

It's rough until you get a full party. It's a system built around chaining attacks and elemental combos and you require a varied team to set those situations up.

If you're new to Xenoblade I can see it feeling like a rather chaotic mess... it basically has that appearance on purpose.

Basically, every Driver has 4 Arts (depending on their weapon from their Blade), 3 of which you can have equipped at a time. You're using these Arts right after auto-attacks (what the game calls Canceling) to build up your Special, a Blade specific move which takes up the 4th 'slot' on your combat diamond in the bottom right.

Specials have elemental properties and are more powerful attacks that require a timed input. The long-term goal in combat is to use these Specials in order of Level 1 to 2, to finally 3 (or more?) which will be your Blade's most powerful attack. Your AI controlled allies will pop-up on screen when their Specials are charging and ready for use, and activate on your command using the LT or RT button. They'll automatically save their Special until it's the appropriate next level to be used to reach a level 3 Special.

The 'road map' to these Special Combos is shown in the top right of the combat screen, and successfully reaching a Level 3 Special does "massive damage," locks out an enemy combat option, but also grants the enemy a barrier against further damage from the final attack's Element. So, if you finish with Pyra and Rex's Burning Sword, Fire damage will be greatly reduced, encouraging (or forcing) flexibility and use of other Blades. As far as I know these final effects last until replaced by another Final Special, but I haven't gotten far enough to see whether the elemental barriers compound or not.

The last (I think?) piece of that puzzle is eventually you get Chains of specials using a full party guage and the goal there is to use opposing elemental specials to break the barrier you've already created and do more mean things in the process. Then repeat.

It's a mess but a fun mess when you get in the rhythm of things.

There's also timing involved when using arts. Your auto attacks come in sets of 3; the first auto attack you do will do the last amount of damage, while your third auto attack will do the most amount of damage. If you say, timed your art right at the same time as your third auto attack, you'll do the most amount of art damage and fill the special gage faster.

Hopefully that makes sense. I'd recommend getting used to the rhythm of your weapon's auto attacks and time in just when the third strike hits and make use of arts that way.

I really love the combat system, now that I have my head wrapped around it. I still don't have it mastered by any means, there is still a lot of stuff I need to do re building out my party and blade combos.

Dude or dudett thanks for this post. I have never played anything in the series but im getting this game. Not knowing anything about nothing this post im sure will help me orientate when i do finally get the game. Much love <3

Something else to keep in mind. once you're far enough in to have an additional slot to equip another Blade is that you should try and keep the MMOish roles in mind.

Nia is your healer so you probably don't want to equip a tank Blade on her since it'll reduce her healing and might make enemies shift their aggro to her. This is even more important considering you're probably leaving the AI in charge of her and you don't want her shifting back and forth randomly.

Rex you can use however you want but since you already have a tank and healer you'll probably want to keep him as an attacker.

Other than that try and equip Blades of different elements so that you have more freedom with your Blade combos.

The battle system becomes a lot more intuitive as you get further in the game, learning more systems and getting a full party. RPG Site posted a really great guide that helped me understand some of the mechanics but it may not be helpful to you yet depending on how early on in the game you are.

My biggest piece of advice if enemies a level or two higher than you are kicking your butt is to rest at an inn and gain the extra experience points you accumulate in each battle. Also make sure you are using your skill points to get new skills and upgrade your Blade weapon.

@lentfilms: Wait you get extra xp from battles that go into the rest xp? I thought it was just all quest experience (which really opens up how much you're getting once you hit chapter 4 and unlock the last menu item).

You guys are awesome.

I understand the cancelling and rhythm of battle part now and forgot about the resting at an inn part of the game.

I'm really enjoying the game now that I have another party member and more blades to experiment with.

I haven't played a JRPG all the way through since FFX and the active battle system in FFXV seemed kinda bad and I never felt fully in control.

Xenoblade seems to be the same as FFXV but just feels a lot better (after 15 hours). Maybe it's the feedback on screen to the player? I don't know. Like the difference between getting the little audio blips on hit in a COD as opposed to a Battlefield.

Again thanks all!

@westernwizard: Well, I might be getting that wrong. I think you are right that the exp does mainly come from side quests and I think main story missions as well. Sorry for the spread of misinformation.

@puchiko: What exactly confuses you?

There are 3 main combo systems in the game:

Driver combos - these are the ones that show up on the top left of the enemy's HP bar. In order they are Break > Topple > Launch > Smash. Even if you can't finish the combo it's very useful getting an enemy into a topple and launch state as they cannot attack in those states. Nia can Break and Tora can Topple so they can cover that first part. Rex eventually unlocks a way to topple (if you're 20 hours in I believe you should have already unlocked it). Launching is a lot like topple though it both extends the duration the enemy can't move and allows you to follow up with a move that has a Smash effect for massive damage. It's not immediately obvious which moves can cause these effects but the game will inform you when looking at the arts in the menu. There are some additional effects like blowdown and knockback but they aren't as important.

Blade combos - these are the flashy, QTE moves which show on the left, right and bottom of the screen. Once the first move is performed the possible followups are shown on the top right of the screen. Even if you can't get to level 3 just following it up once will deal quite a bit of damage to an enemy and should speed things up. From the top of my head an easy combo which is always available is Pyra > Poppy > Pyra. To actually perform these moves you need to fill out the special meter on the a button by using arts. This bar fills up a lot faster if you "cancel" your autoattack with the art. You'll know it worked because there will be a blue ring that forms around your character. If you do manage to finish one of these combos an orb will form around the enemy - the colour will be based on what the last attack's element was. The orb will make buff the enemy's resistance to that element so for other Blade combos another element should be used to finish.

Chain Attack - This system unlocks last and requires all 3 bars at the top left of the screen (the so called party gauge) to be filled. Honestly I don't recommend using this since the party gauge is also needed to help incapacitated allies. So either use this when one or two orbs from Blade combos have gathered around your enemy or for random mobs (some affinity rewards are tied to doing chain attacks). This isn't very complicated at all so I'll leave it at that.

Not sure if this helped at all but at the very least it could help someone else that doesn't quite get what these terms are.

I'm trying to understand the combat, but nothing anyone said in this thread was normal english lol

Gamespot put up a video that helped me wrap my head around it. I wasn't understanding the chains. It's a lot more simple than it initially appears.

@puchiko: The icons for the Blade combos will show up when the party members have built enough meter to actual perform the attack. So it's not so much a case of the game thinking it's a good time to do it as much as it informing you that it can be done. Usually it's a good bet to go ahead with whichever is available but keep in mind that it'll delay they're other attacks. So let's say Nia just used a Break move and Tora's icon showed up for his special (Stone I think?). If you activate it straight away he probably won't get the chance to make use of the break and topple the enemy. If it's against trash mobs it might not matter but against a boss or unique monster it's probably worth waiting for him to topple.

The only other thing to keep in mind is that once the first special is activated you're stuck in that "queue" so your allies' icons will only pop up if they have a special of the element that will move you to the next stage of the combo. So for example if you start with Earth, stage 2 might only have Fire and Earth as possible continuations - in this case Nia's icon won't show (unless you've equipped her with a Fire or Earth Blade) even though she may have enough meter for a special. Since you control Rex you can use whatever specials you want even if it doesn't continue the combo (and it won't break it either). Once the combo has ended by either reaching stage 3 or the bar on the top right of the enemy's HP emptying everyone's icons will pop back up (as long as they have meter).

As for Chain Attacks yes, they are the most damaging tool but you won't get to 3 bars in one fight unless you're fighting a boss or unique monster. That shouldn't matter though since the Chain Attack bar carries over from fight to fight so you'll eventually get to 3. When you say the 2nd part of the chain attack what do you mean exactly? Do you mean going a 2nd round? I don't have a full grasp of this yet but I think it's somewhat random - similar to previous games. You can increase the chances of going multiple rounds by breaking the orbs left from Blade combos and scoring Excellents on the QTEs.

I think a second round of chains requires that you break orbs, that's the only time I've seen it and it was the example that the tutorial used to teach you.

If you get a full 3-stage Blade combo off on a mob it'll put an element orb of the attacks element on the enemy. You can stack an element orb of each element onto a single creature but most story stuff you'll only need one or two because their health is so low. When in a chain attack, attacks of certain elements will either damage or break the orbs, opposite elements to the orb will almost always break the orb immediately. When you break an orb, you get more combo time and a QTE to refresh the cooldown on all your Blades. If you miss the QTE the Blades you used in the previous round will be on cooldown, which is a big problem if in the early game with Tora since he only has one Blade to contribute to the combo chain. If he doesn't have a Blade to contribute the chain will end regardless of other factors.

@krolikoff: You are definitely meant to switch Blades as necessary, Pyra will more than likely be way better until you start getting good rolls on opening core crystals but the generics can still be used for combos. Which character you control is just personal preference. They all have defined roles as their initial setups but again amassing a squad of rare blades will make them pretty customizable too.

The pouch is pretty hands off, if you have multiples of something it will automatically refill when the timer goes out unless you tell it to stop.

The game saves as one is being open so I assume that prevents scumming them but I also didn't try after seeing that prompt since reloading is kind of a bother.

@puchiko: The top right of the screen when you initiate a blade combo will give you the map you need to finish with the level 3 blade combo. Depending on what you start with, you might've started a blade combo but had no elements that would follow it up properly. Also, each part of the blade combo requires a different level of blade art. You initiate with a level 1, then follow up with a level 2, and finish with a level 3. Though I should state that the 2nd part of the combo needs a level 2 minimum. I'm pretty sure you can use a level 3 as the 2nd part of the combo. Another thing to take note is the orbs spinning around the character image for the blade combo. The level they are currently at will correspond to the number of orbs that are orbiting around their image.

@midnightgreen20: Yes the requirement for the combos at all 3 levels is only minimum. You can use 1-4 for opener, 2-4 for 2nd part, 3-4 for closer (and if at all possible closing with a level 4 is a good idea, does something like 2x the damage of level 3 finishers). Though I wonder if it changes how hard the orbs are to break, early on only took one to crack with chain attacks, but now I'm needing 2 proper element attacks to break them.

One of the reasons I don't like the the first game is for the combat so I don't think i want this if it's kinda the same

@frostyryan: If you played the first game and did not like the combat fundamentally (aka not rough edges or the like) I would not play this game as while it has some new/changed mechanics, at its core you've got the same style.

The changes to the battle system this time around makes it very combo and cancelling heavy. Straight up, if you aren't cancelling, you aren't being efficient. It's neat, but a lot. You're still mashing auto attacks and arts as in Xenoblade 1, so I wouldn't pick it up if you didn't enjoy fighting in the first game.

Small tip, you can cancel your auto-attack chain at the third and final combo by moving a tiny bit. This cancels the lengthy animation that runs to reset the auto-attack chain back to zero. This will speed up auto-attacks and lets you build arts a bit quicker.

Don't enjoy it != bad design.

I think a lot of us enjoy it a great deal, this to me is the most entertaining JRPG combat system in ages. It takes a while to kill trash mobs when you're not good at it or early in the game, but once it clicks it's really easy to mow down garbage, and bosses are ALWAYS satisfying. Optional higher level mobs can require setting up a lot of dominos, it feels like juggling 4-5 things at once, and it's super good feeling when you knock them down afterwards for insane damage.

There are parts of this game that are poorly designed. The tutorials are flawed on several fronts. Times they seemed to give short shrift to important systems, plus the simple fact you cannot go back to them. The Map takes too much effort to get to the most useful information (and frankly the shop icons should tell you what they are when you put them cursor over them much like the challenge points tell you how to complete them).

The combat is not on that list, other than how fast they shove it all in your face with tutorials (minus a few parts that are only revealed WAY later). Especially once you get to a point you can start taking advantage of full smash combos, both for the damage and the drops (I'm getting overrun with common cores now...)

I thought the game did a great job initially teaching you how to play it just fucks up and makes it impossible to ever reference that stuff again.

Like I'm good now but if something happens and I need to put the game down for a week? Oof.

@efesell said:

I feel the same way. The initial presentation was alright and i got the hang of it. Now real life has come between me and the game and upon returning to it I struggled with the combat.

@puchiko: Boy, you must've never played Resonance of Fate then, because that game was broo-tall. Seriously, nothing I've ever played in the JRPG space ever came close to the shit that game asks you to do, and on top of that it's just plain hard. Xenoblade 2 might have a lot going on, but is ultimately just an average difficulty game.

Anyway, I'll echo the sentiment that it's crazy how they didn't add an in-game manual like the first game. You look away once, miss a textbox, and you're screwed. Hopefully the next tutorial will touch upon it again, otherwise you'll have to get the information from an unofficial source. That's unacceptable. Once they abolished physical manuals, they at least gave you decent alternatives in-game. Not sure how this game shipped without one.

The combat itself is great, though. My only complaint is that it's a bit of one-trick pony. You set get a boss down to half health while setting up 2 or 3 elemental orbs in the process, and go in for the kill. Works every time.

I LOVE Resonance of Fate's battle system. The game certainly didn't have great tutorials, but the difficulty was sloped enough that it was enjoyable learning the battle system piece by piece over the first 20 hours or so. I can see the xenoblade being another game where you need to put a lot into it to get a lot out of it, but I'm disappointed to see these issues come up again after the first two games also didn't explain themselves well when there's enough going on it's hard to grok even if you have a lot of rpg experience.

@puchiko: Uh, this is my first Xenoblade game too, fam. I just read what the tutorials said, and looked at the various UI prompts. It doesn't make all of THOSE clear, but if you just look at them and read them they're all very clearly labelled at least.

This game absolutely has a complicated battle system, but it's introduced so slowly, and IS properly tutorialized, if you're paying attention and willing to experiment with it for just a couple minutes at most it's pretty easy to grasp.

Game has managed to sneak in one more major game mechanic and tutorial 80 hours later.

So I am finally on chapter 8 and saw the power of a certain someone (Finally seeing damage numbers over 200k). I have a question regarding this but will spoiler block it.

@puchiko:

@puchiko: BTW one thing I didn't know (may have missed it in the tutorial)

I find it amusing that you get hit with another battle tutorial pop-up in Chapter 10 but the next few story fights don't have a way to actually use what they just said.

Eh it's available real soon.

It's kind of just for fun anyway.