Weapon Upgrading

[Jojimbo]

You don't really get more powerful weapons, you just get weapons that are designed for a different person or have different effects.

Generally, you have the 1 or 2 balanced weapons, one pure str, one pure mag, one with highest mag/str of any weapon but means you cannot increase chain guage (so only works well on com). Some have special abilities and syth groups (where you pair items in same group to gain/incease a certain effect). Spec ab are things like increased curing for van, improved counter for fang and guard for snow. Weapons with these will have lower mag/str that others (sometimes less than half of the balanced type). When you get ultimate weapon you lose syth group (but keep specials).

[Kiarax]

but you have to sell the items that you're incidentally buying in order to upgrade, which makes no sense ????

I'm not as far as you, but I've just been selling regular items. Been getting tons of Phoenix Downs and I'm a good 10 hours in without using a single one now. Sold like 20 of them 500 gil each. Been selling all my Shroud items too as I never use the damn things.

Edit: Also stuff like Credit Chip. Not certain where I got them but they only gave 1 XP for upgrades but sold for 1k Gil each. I'm sure there's other stuff that is worth selling for Gil rather than using for XP.

[Correction]

Credit/Premium Chips drop from humanoid soldier types, which are in abundance in the first 10 chapters.

but you have to sell the items that you're incidentally buying in order to upgrade, which makes no sense

Don't sell everything just the crap that only gives 1 exp to weapons. Hoard everything else and sink it into weapon upgrades, starting with organic materials to build exp bonus then mechanical parts to jump ahead in exp in large strides.

Only buy shit once you're at or past the end of the game and you have hundreds of thousands of gold to spend. Once you can farm the Titan quests money comes in pretty damn quick and all of your upgrading will be done via the "buy colored jelly, sink micro fusion reactors" method.

[Maguspk]

I feel like I should be upgrading but I hate investing in upgrades and then regretting it later on. For example, Lightning in my party is using the Gladius I found at the beginning of the game. Would that be a good choice to upgrade or should I save it and wait until I get the Lionheart I saw someone mention earlier?

[Hitoru]

I feel like I should be upgrading but I hate investing in upgrades and then regretting it later on. For example, Lightning in my party is using the Gladius I found at the beginning of the game. Would that be a good choice to upgrade or should I save it and wait until I get the Lionheart I saw someone mention earlier?

I capped my Gladius since it's been the only weapon I've used for her up to this point. I picked up the Stagger Maint gun for Sazh as well and capped that too. I plan to fuck with Lionheart when I get there, but for now if you have the gil and/or items, it's worth it to cap the weapon.

Very nice STR boost as well as a bit more Magic. With that and some capped out accessories, her damage will go up nicely.

[Kaisha]

So....organic items have an X mark like icon, mechanical have a bolt right?

Also, I got this Millerite thing in my inventory with a crystal like icon, what's that for? Is there much in worrying about which kinds of organic items I use on my weapons, or are there some I should hoard for specific purposes?


And regarding the XP bonus, it seems to change on a per XP basis, so I take it when I want to use mechanical on an x3, that I'd be best off dumping a large amount of a single component type in one go?

[Abandon]

That's for upgrading certain weapons once you get the weapon maxed out. And yes, I'd max the exp multiplier first, then do the big exp dump.

[Maguspk]

After you get a weapon to 3x exp, does doing all the exp items at once render the 3x bonus to everything or does it slowly go down on a per item basis? The reason I ask is because if it doesn't then it's obviously more efficient to get the exp ot 3x then wait until you can drop like a fuckton of a mechanical item in for exp all at once. Just wondering, I'm not upgrading anything atm so I can't test it.

[Yuri-G]

EXP bonus doesn't always go down, it's a chance-based thing. That said, it's still a better idea to dump a ton of items at once.

Edit: Wait... after reading up on this a bit more, I'm not so sure it's chance-based. I thought so because it doesn't upgrade or downgrade every time you use an item, but it sounds like it might be based on the quantity of the item you use. Like, use ten of item X and it'll go down 25% on the last one.

I'm really not so sure anymore. So yeah, sorry, I can't help. But it still seems like a better idea to dump a lot of EXP into an item at once, as long as you don't go over the level 10 cap.

[Jojimbo]

Each item has a hidden exp mod, mech has generally large negative mods, while organic have smaller but positive mods (best organic items seem to be sturdy bone, barded tail, vibrant ooze (+14, 80 gil), otherworldly bone, diabolic tail, transparent ooze (+21, 150 gil)).

0-50 = x1, 51-100 x1.25, 101-200 = x1.5, 201-250 = 1.75, 251-500 = x2, 501+ = x3.

Exp mod values should be constant, the exp you gain from an item depends on the equips rank. Higher rank = lower exp, I don't think theres a way to tell the rank in game other than looking at how much exp you get from an item.

[Katlan]

Any recommendations on upgrading Lights basic weapon or the Gladius? Only downside I can think of is that her magic wont be affective as a rav

[Maguspk]

It also seems like maybe the exp/gil ratios might be better for some mechanical items. Which mechanical items from the shop should I be buying? I can't find a list of the best mechanical items from the shop but some are definitely better than others so I don't want to sink money until I know for sure.

[Yuri-G]

Any recommendations on upgrading Lights basic weapon or the Gladius? Only downside I can think of is that her magic wont be affective as a rav

I'm wondering this too. I've upgraded Sazh and Lightning's basic weapons to around level 6 so far, but I'm nervous about upgrading too much in case I get a better weapon later and have used up most of my items. Or do you want to basically just upgrade one weapon the whole game long and keep evolving it?

[Atreides]

the thing I noticed is that in the book, it shows that all the final weapons have the same name, but have different stats based on whatever weapon they started off as. So I'm not really sure what I should pick. It seems like Blazefire Saber is only slightly lower attack then the Gladius (which has like almost no magic, not that Lightning is ever on RAV for me) but has no additional effects like some of the other ones, but I guess you can impart abilities to the weapons later via synthesis?

The fact that you can upgrade accessories too makes the whole system seem almost too big for a completionist like me, chances are I'm going to try to upgrade 1 of everything at the end of the game and get frustrated and never finish, lol

[Kurp]

I'm tempted to upgrade Lightning's Axis Blade. It's so much fun paired with Whistlewind Scarf (+10% ATB speed with both the scarf and sword equipped) and Haste.

I just got to chapter 11 and still haven't upgraded anything heh.

[Katlan]

the thing I noticed is that in the book, it shows that all the final weapons have the same name, but have different stats based on whatever weapon they started off as. So I'm not really sure what I should pick. It seems like Blazefire Saber is only slightly lower attack then the Gladius (which has like almost no magic, not that Lightning is ever on RAV for me) but has no additional effects like some of the other ones, but I guess you can impart abilities to the weapons later via synthesis?

Im in ch6 and the synthesis thing (combined weapons/accessories) hasnt rly been explained, is there gonna be a tutorial for it? lol

[Jojimbo]

I'm on ch.10 and it hasn't been explained, I think you're suppose to do it through trial and error (or use the guide)

[Yuri-G]

Hmm, so you can get any of the final weapons from any base weapon, but their stats will differ depending on what they started as?

That makes sense I guess. Sorta like Dark Cloud 2, but far more open-ended.

I think I'll just upgrade as I need to (e.g. upgrading Sazh's weapon since he and Vanille were split off and he just got the COM role) and not worry too much about it, then. As long as I can upgrade whatever "perfect weapons" I want later on, possibly postgame, I'm ok.

I hear grinding gets a lot easier around Chapter 11 anyway, so why bother holding onto these dinky little customization items I have now if you can grind for massive gil and items later?

I have to say, I'm liking the fact that there's very little missable content in the game. It sounds like elemental rings are pretty much the only thing that matters that you can permanently miss. It makes things a lot less stressful for people who want to get a platinum trophy.

[Wakabo]

I am still scared to upgrade weapons haha. I am afraid I am going to mess up at some point and not be able to get the "best of the best".

I don't know what weapon for each character to upgrade too Mainly focused on Lightning/Sazh getting them to level 2 then stopped.

[Katlan]

Lets say you are upgrading Lightning's base weapon, but then later switch to a weapon that has a special stat, can you combine the weapons to keep some of stat's of the weapon you had previously been upgrading? Or does only special properties carry over

The guide says that Lightning makes a better ravager later in the game, so I don't want to Upgrade Gladius knowing its gonna gimp her magic