Xenoblade Chronicles 2 Blade, Combat and Quests FAQ

Last update 2017-12-19. WIP. This pastebin is spoiler free.

Q: Missable content / just starting tips?
- Save often. The game does not autosave and can randomly crash after hours of gameplay.
- Don't kill the Calf outside Torrigoth
- Sidequests in Indolean Praetoreum expire at Chapter 8. Though, their rewards are not of much value.
- Rex gains the ability to use anyone else's blades at Chapter 8, so keep that in mind when using core crystals on him.
- Winding gears have a higher drop rate from the salvage points on Lascham Island, to the right of Torrigoth when you're facing the entrance.
- Affinity chart unlocks don't actually unlock until you open the affinity chart page in the character menu, so make sure to take a look at your affinity charts periodically.
- Be careful of moving a blade from one driver to another. Doing so uses an Overdrive Protocol, and while the game gives you 3 early on, they are otherwise only available from late-game farming. See "Overdrive protocols?"
- The "Auto-attack damage" stat of a blade is used for the computing the base damage of arts, and not simply auto-attack.
- Perceval's affinity quest "Failure and Success" can become uncompletable, as the scripted encounter can refuse to happen. Making sure the quest is your active quest before you go see Pupunin in the dead of night seems to avoid the bug.
- A common source of confusion is trying to progress a blade's affinity quest, while forgetting that you disengaged the blade. The blade must be engaged for its affinity quest markers to show up.
- The number of white spinning orbs around a party member's pop-up during a blade combo show what stage special they have ready, the color indicates the element of the blade they are currently using

Ctrl+F for "rare blade" if that's all your interested in.

Q: How do I stay alive / win battle X?
See "What is this battle system?" first for a multi-step battle tutorial.

If that doesn't answer your question, see "What blades should I engage?" "What is the party member AI?" "What is spike damage / purple damage / why did I mysteriously die when X got below half health?" "How do I get SP / WP?" "Tips for end-game combat?"

Q: How do I raise dev level?
Side quests, talking to people with stars, trading in stuff to the trader, purchasing and selling things at shops, and merc missions all raise dev level. But, none of this matters because there is a trick to raise any town's dev level to 5. See "Gold cylinder buy / sell trick?" at the bottom of this guide for details.

Q: I accidentally released a rare blade! Help!
The game only autosaves on using a core, so try just reloading your last save. Otherwise, released rare blades can be retrieved using core crystals. This includes rare blades that came from unique core crystals and were then released.

Q: How do I change the cloud sea tide level?
Take a long rest at an inn. The default option, short rest, doesn't do it.

Q: How do I check what chapter of the game I'm in?
Go to start menu (+) -> "System" -> "Save" and even without saving it shows your current chapter at the bottom.

Q: How do I make money?
After reaching Chapter 4, See "Salvaging at Mor Ardain?"
- Just don't worry about being poor until Chapter 4, please.

Q: How do I get more common / rare cores?
After reaching Chapter 4, see "Salvaging at Mor Ardain?"
- Just don't worry about rolling for rare cores until Chapter 4, please.

Q: How do I get more legendary cores?
After you've reached ~lvl 70, see "Smashing unique monsters for legendary cores?"

Q: Poppi ether farming / Poppi builds?
- Better parts unlock as you find technical manuals in the wild, check the "Blade H2H / Affinity Quests" tab of this sheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mKrSAAi_sj8xpt7t8s1JGMRUh4O-e7MxAb2P_g9AWOM/edit
- You can sell parts you get for ether by pressing "Y" at the menu where you usually purchase parts.
- Stage 5 drops the best parts, and is the only way to get "master" tier upgrades that cannot be bought for ether. The ability to play stage 5 unlocks later in the story.

An anon posted his ATK poppi build in the thread:
> As an AI (or if you use him as a main) the shield move is never used and it doesn't build aggro. My AI has never used it when i built him this way and he stays in Qtpie mode all the time unless he is doing a combo. You can remove all aggro building moves from all the poppis. As for my build (everything is of the highest level it can be, master mods are preferred but the level V mods work fine):

> QTpie (fully upgraded ether) - Muscle mod V, AC arts boost, AC Accuracy Up, AC Recharge Boost, Critical Up, Affinity MAX atk, Strong foundation lll, AB Vital Charge lll, AB Affinity Boost, Double Attack ll, challenger V, Fast Blade Switch lV

> QT (not fully upgraded) - Master Strike, System Reset V, Recharge boost l, Fast Blade switch lV, Treasure Senor l

> Alpha (not fully upgraded) - System Reset lll, Damage Absorb lll, Ultimate Shield, Fast blade Switch lV, Block Rate Up

Q: Premium cylinders?
Premium cylinders are a reward for raising your salvage level and are sometimes, randomly, available in stock at cylinder stores. To check your salvage level and get the reward, talk to the Nopon Mochichi on a balcony on an upper level of the central exchange in Argentum. What makes premium cylinder go into / out of stock is unknown.
- They are reported to sometimes go into / go out of stock after both long and short rests.
- There is one side quest that requires premium cylinders

Q: How do I get more pouch slots?
There are 6 pouch expansion items in the game, 2 are given from the main story. For the other 4:
1) Near Boulderbore Gate in Gormott Province Upper Level, inside a cave
2) Leftherian Archipelago -> Fonsett Waters -> Godsford Isle teleport (if you don't have it, it's the out of the way high up island to the NE of the map), immediately turn around and walk until you reach to the edge and land on the moving platform.  Stand on the moving platform and get off at the _second_ island with a chest, the first you pass just has a collection point.
3) [spoiler area] unlocked early in Ch 7 -> Lower Level -> Southmost point of the map -> Behind a crest-marked wall under a staircase
4) >See We Meet Again Sidequest. Fast Travel to Kedeigh Gate and head east to the Smuide Factory, climb up the first ladder and then take the farther ladder up. Take the tram ride and drop down to where the deer monsters are. You have to kill the UM and go to the ledge. (You can see two indented lines on the L3 map)
https://i.imgur.com/0PTn8rj.png

Q: How do I advance rare blade X's affinity tree? Where do X's affinity quests / heart to hearts appear?
Check the Blade H2H / Affinity Quests tab of this google spreadsheet:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mKrSAAi_sj8xpt7t8s1JGMRUh4O-e7MxAb2P_g9AWOM/edit

Q: How do I raise trust?
Using a blade in combat, merc missions, and using pouch items all increase trust.
- See the "Trust" tab of this document for items that always give 15 trust to all engaged blades (the max?). Use an item that is noone's favorite to avoid the dialogue cue when spamming the item.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mKrSAAi_sj8xpt7t8s1JGMRUh4O-e7MxAb2P_g9AWOM/edit

Q: How do I unlock this affinity node?
You can only unlock a node in the affinity graph if (1) the left-most light-blue node in that ring of nodes is unlocked, and (2) you have to unlock nodes in order along each line of nodes going out from the center. Note that requirements of nodes are usually handled retroactively, so you can fulfill the requirements for a later node and have it unlock immediately when it becomes unlockable.
- Sending a blade on merc missions tends to randomly unlock affinity nodes, but only some nodes can be unlocked this way (usually those with basic requirements such as "collect X" or "defeat enemy Y in Z", but not, for example, Zenobia's quests where you must defeat certain unique enemies.)
-- Importantly, merc missions alone can always completely fill out a common blade's affinity tree, because they always have only basic requirements. This is useful for filling out, say, 4-crown common blades' affinity pages.

Q: Snow white rhino???
Has to be high tide to get to the island, and change time to "just at the crack of dawn" (5 AM)

Q: Uncover the Truth / Salvage King / Nopon Doubloons / Bana's Secret Treasure quests?
This spreadsheet has guides for these quests and some others, beware of possible spoilers though:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1HKkPoCbW0oO1JzV-hx21ueZMIjmWdboVh3vgSrlEwj4/edit

Q: Blade shackle / Driver shackle?
Shackle Blade - no specials and no blade switching
Shackle Driver - no arts

Q: What types of blades should I engage?
Using 3 HLR, 3 TNK, or 3 ATK is usually the best for two reasons. First, this triggers "master class" bonuses that are usually the most useful (see the "Driver Class" of the linked spreadsheet below.) Second, AI-controlled party members never switch in order to fulfill a class role, for example, a party member won't switch to a HLR if the party is low on health. See "What is the party member AI?" for what the AI will do correctly. That being said, for the player-controlled character, mixing classes can be effective.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1-SFdq7dm-3ON4w1wOaHMBr4dEz6NnkFH21QLtDuu1qY/edit#gid=1721347878

Q: What is this battle system?
The game incrementally introduces the battle system as you progress through the story, so the answer to this question depends on what is available to you.

EARLY ON: Battling is pretty much just do auto-attacks to charge up your arts (there is a gauge around each arts icon that shows whether it is charged,) and then "cancel" auto-attacks into arts by using them right after the blade enters the enemy (you should see a blue circle.) Auto-attacks come in 3's, and the third always does the most damage, and when you cancel an auto-attack into an art the damage of the art uses the the auto attack you canceled for its base damage - THEREFORE, you should try to cancel always the third auto-attack for maximum arts damage.

- Pro technique "Stutter-step:" You can move your character slightly after the third auto-attack to skip a bit of lagtime before starting the next sequence of auto-attacks.

- As soon as possible, you should try to get the driver affinity node that lets you cancel an art into another art. The way this works is that if you cancel an art into another art, the auto-attack that you cancelled to use the first art (assuming you did cancel) is also used as the base damage for the second art. So, with this upgrade you can wait for the third auto-attack, cancel that into your first art, cancel that art into your second, and cancel that art into your third.  This does the same damage as if you had cancelled third auto attacks into all three arts, but it's a lot more efficient to do it this way.
-- The timing for cancelling an art into an art can be tricky, but it always works to just mash the art after using another art. Using an art greys out the other arts briefly, and the timing for a cancel is always the moment when the other arts become usable again.

MID-GAME (At least chapter 3+): Blade-switching unlocks, and break/topple/launch/smash mechanic and special/blade combo mechanics are introduced. The first mechanic is the same as in XC1, the second is new to XC2.

When you switch to a different blade (by pressing a direction on the D-pad) all of the arts on the new blade will be immediately ready to use. This means you should be switching around blades when possible to use more of your arts. Blades have a cooldown that prevents you from switching to them immediately at the beginning of battle, this is shown as a gauge around the blade's icon.

Break/topple/launch/smash: The pompous-ass term given to this mechanic by the game is "Driver combo" and also "reactions." Start by using an art that inflicts break. An enemy with break can be toppled (by an appropriate art.) And so forth, an enemy with topple can be launched, and an enemy with launch can be smashed. And then you start over.
- When an enemy is smashed, it drops money and often items from its "smash" drop table. Most enemies' smash drop tables are very similar to their actual drop table, this means that you can farm the drops from a high level monster that you can't kill but you can smash, and then run away after you get what you want. See "Smashing unique monsters for legendary cores?"

Specials/3-part blade combos: Specials reach higher tiers (I, II, III, IV) if you let them charge up longer. When using a special of any tier, a bar shows up at the top of the screen that counts down. Before the bar runs out, you want to use an appropriate special to continue the 3-part blade combo, but doing so can be a bit of a puzzle:
- 3-part blade combos involve a tier I or higher special, followed by a tier II or higher special, followed by a tier III.
- The elements of the blade impart an element to the special, and the elements in the 3-part blade combo have to follow one of a handful of progressions. For example, Fire -> Fire -> Fire is a blade combo but Fire -> Fire -> Earth is not.
-- The valid elemental progressions are shown at the top right of the screen when you use a special, as a "tree" of elements that fans out from the left to the right. It can be a bit confusing to read, so check out the "Blade Combos" tab of this document for some help understanding it:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1mKrSAAi_sj8xpt7t8s1JGMRUh4O-e7MxAb2P_g9AWOM/edit
- When you complete a 3-part blade combo, a debuff is placed on the enemy based on the last element used. See the above document for the details, but for example, a combo ending in Wind inflicts "Seal blowdown" which prevents the enemy from using moves that inflict blowdown - very useful! Note that this debuff overwrites the last blade combo debuff applied, so you can't seal blowdown and seal shackle driver at the same time, unfortunately.

If you combine the above two mechanics, i.e. use break/topple/launch/smash while doing a blade combo, various bonuses can occur. Big text shows up on the screen with some icons, these icons indicate one of the following has occurred:
- Time extension (more time to use the next step of the blade combo)
- Damage up (Damage is increased while the blade combo is ongoing)
As well as some other bonuses.

LATE-GAME: Elemental orb/chain attack mechanic is introduced. This is where we start getting the big damage. After finishing a 3-part blade combo, the last element used is added as an elemental orb that orbits the enemy. When the party gauge is full (the segmented bar at the top left of the screen) press "+" to start a chain attack, where elemental orbs get broken. The goal is to place as many different elemental orbs as possible, then to enter chain attack, and to then destroy as many of the elemental orbs as possible to reach massive damage buffs.
- Some common blades have the ability "Orb mastery" that allows them to place their elemental orb even if they are not the 3rd special in a blade combo. Useful for quickly placing 5+ elemental orbs on an enemy.

Chain attacks occur in "rounds," and in each round each party member can attack with a blade. That blade will hit a random orb for 1 damage, or if that blade's element is the weakness of one of the orbs, it will target that orb and do 2 damages. Orbs break when they have taken 3 damage.
- Orbs are weak to the "opposite" element, i.e. Fire <-> water, Light <-> dark, Wind <-> Ice, Electric <-> Earth.
- There are some aux cores and blade skills that change how blades hit orbs during a chain attack.

Killing an enemy with a chain attack activates an "Overkill Bonus" which increases your exp gained to: BaseExp x (1 + Overkill Bonus.)

Q: Blade combos are hard to pull off?
- Properly canceling the third auto attack in the sequence into an art recharges your special by 0.625 tiers.
-- TODO: Test whether AI-controlled party members always properly cancel arts
- Unlocking cancel-art-into-arts affinity node is also very good for filling special quickly, see "Should I get the cancel-art-into-an-art affinity node?"
- Narcipear Jelly from the Argentum Bazaar lets you use arts much faster, cancel those arts to fill your special meter.
- Musical pouch items recharge special quickly
- Certain shield arts recharge special very quickly
- Plan your blade combo to use all 3 party members. For example, wait until both party members have at least tier 2 special charged, and then use your special. Then, use one of the party members tier 2 specials, and then before that runs out use the remaining party member's tier 3 special.
-- Party members will automatically switch blade to have an element that continues the combo
- A reasonable use of common blades is to provide an element that continues a blade combo you use often.

Q: What is the party member AI? When do they switch weapons?
If there isn't a combo up, they will switch when they don't have any arts to perform. If there is a combo up that can use a certain element, they will keep to that element no matter what, until the gauge runs down.

>Will they switch blades to use a launch special if the enemy is stumbled?

Yes, but Blade Combo takes priority, so don't expect them to do them if you are waiting on an element.

>One of my party members is not switching away from a particular blade -- Ever!

There seems to be a glitch with the AI that locks them into one blade, even if the above switch conditions are met. If this happens to you, try removing the stuck blade for an encounter and then putting them back in afterwards.
- Post in the thread if that doesn't work.

Q: What is spike damage / purple damage / why did I mysteriously die when X got below half health ?
Purple damage numbers come from spike damage, which damages you every time you strike the enemy with anything. Chain attacks bypass spike damage, and many enemies with spike damage only activate the spikes when they enrage, so usually it's an invitation to kill the enemy with a chain attack.
- The Spike Defense aux cores reduce spike damage (up to 88% reduction). For locations, Ctrl+F in the Drops tab of the document below.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1FyYYaSARbKdzGAWE1WEGORYjvXMamAYPGeXwzNai9kM/edit#gid=0

Q: What is reflect damage?
Very few enemies in this game reflect damage, of note is the lvl 117 super boss who shall not be named to avoid spoilers. Anyway, if reflecting is an issue try using the Reflect Immunity aux core. For locations, Ctrl+F in the Drops tab of the document below.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1FyYYaSARbKdzGAWE1WEGORYjvXMamAYPGeXwzNai9kM/edit#gid=0

Q: How do I get SP / WP?
You get 300 SP per level up and some from sidequests. You get a small amount of WP from killing enemies and by using WP boosting items from completing blade's affinity charts, see "What are the rewards for maxing out a driver's / rare blade's / common blade's affinity sheet?"

Q: How do I get rare blades?
There are 38 total rare blades: 11 rare blades given directly by the main story, plus 5 from side quests, plus 1 purchasable in a shop in Torrigoth for 500K. The remaining 21 rare blades are only available (randomly) from common / rare / legendary core crystals. For these, see "How do I get core crystal rare blades?"

Q: How do I get core crystal rare blades?
Both common cores and rare cores are easily farmable as soon as Ch. 4, see "Salvaging at Mor Ardain?", so don't worry about using cores. Assuming you don't have many rare blades from cores, common cores give a 5% drop rate of rare blades and rare cores give 20% (very rough estimates). Higher Luck stat improves the drop rate. These odds can be deceptive - due to how cores are rolled, it can be hard to get a particular blade you want or, heaven forbid, you are trying to get all 21. See "Coupon collector's problem" paragraph below for a discussion of the odds as you collect more rare blades.
- Legendary cores should have higher drop rate than rare cores, so if you are ~lvl 70 consider farming legendary cores, see "Smashing unique monsters for legendary cores?"

You cannot pull two of the same rare blade at the same time, but you can release a blade and reroll it on another character (it will have its affinity tree and trust value preserved when you get it back.) We don't know how to control what blades will roll for a particular character; see "Boosters?" below for a tantalizing possibility (though in the Author's experience, Boosters are not reliable for rare blades.) If you pull a blade that you would prefer on another character, you have two options: Use an overdrive protocol or release the rare blade and hope to pull it again on another character. See "Overdrive protocols?"

You're likely to get a lot of common cores while rolling for rares. If you happen to get a 4-crown common (very rare even on rare cores) don't free it! They can be turned into Overdrive Protocols. See "Overdrive protocols?"

Coupon collector's problem:
This is the author's speculation based on roll rates reported by multiple sources, but rare blades don't seem to be pulled from a pool with some frequency as you might expect. Instead, I propose the game rolls a random number in some range, say 0-400 for common cores, and if the result is between 1 and 21, it gives you the rare with that id (say, 17 = Zenobia.) If the result is not in that range, or if you roll a rare you already have, the game generates a common. This makes it 20x harder to get a particular rare blade than to get any rare blade, and from the mathematical coupon collector's problem (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coupon_collector%27s_problem) it takes ~80 times as long to collect all 21 rare blades as it does to collect a single one. Another way of describing this phenomenon: while there is a high probability you will get some rare blades relatively quickly, there is a high probability that there will be at least one rare blade that eludes you for a very long time. And that blade might be the very one you actually care about, unfortunately.

Good luck on your pulls.

Q: Boosters?
Common blades (and possibly rare blades) are associated with one of four "idea" levels:
 - Fire / water = "Bravery"
 - Wind / ice = "Truth"
 - Electric / earth = "Compassion"
 - Light / dark = "Justice"
The pompous-ass term "Thought cloud system" is the term given by the game to each character having some number of idea levels in each pool. You can gain idea levels by filling out affinity charts of blades on that character (common blades are useful for this purpose) and you can temporarily increase a level by using boosters when bonding with a core.

Roughly 50% of your commons will have the element of the highest idea stat, but more testing is necessary to see exactly how idea stats determine the element of commons. It is not clear whether idea levels have any impact on rare pulls.

If you do any testing, please post in the thread.

Q: Overdrive protocols?
Overdrive protocols are consumables used to move a blade to another driver. This shows up as an option on one of the blade menus when you have one of this item. There are 3 ways to get overdrive protocols: (1) 3 overdrive protocols easily available during the early game (see list below.) (2) Maxing a Driver's affinity sheet (requires a lot of SP.) and (3) Maxing a 4-crown common blade's affinity sheet and releasing them. 4-crown common blades have a small chance (10%?) to drop from legendary cores, and they are extremely rare from rare cores (<1%?). Legendary cores become farmable once you are ~lvl 70. See "Smashing unique monsters for legendary cores?"
- Chests containing overdrive protocols:
-- Chest in Torigoth, near Driver recruiters
-- Chest in Garfont Village, One in Mercenary's village behind some tents
-- Chest in Mor Ardain's capital, go inside the inn, upstairs, head to the open hot spring baths and look in one of the changing rooms

Q: What are the rewards for maxing out a driver's / rare blade's / common blade's affinity sheet?
Useful consumable items.
- Driver: Overdrive protocol x 1.
- Rare blade: Intermediate weaponry x 2 + Ultimate weaponry x 1. The first one raises WP by 3000, the latter by 5000.
- Common blade: Weaponry for Noobs x 3. Raises WP by 1000. If the blade is 4-crown, then after maxing their affinity sheet, releasing them will give an overdrive protocol.

Q: Smashing unique monsters for legendary cores?
If you are around ~lvl 70, the fastest way to get legendary cores is to smash the lvl 130 superboss in temperantia. Despite being the highest level enemy in the game, it is easy to run in, smash, grab legendary cores, run out, and repeat, even at ~lvl 70. You'll also get some ridiculously good loot, as you would expect from the highest level monster in the game.

Tips for smashing:
- Poppi Qt Pi's break move has 3 chances to break, making it the best break move in the game.
- Beta Scope accessory increases break chance. Highly recommended.
- If you are missing, you aren't breaking - use glove accessories that increase your dex to hit more often.
-- For the lvl 130 superboss, target a dexterity of ~330.
- "Gold chip" weapon chips give a +50% to item drop rate, and this stacks with treasure sensor tiers on your blades. Gold chips are easily farmed by smashing Vampire Bride Marion, see below.

If the level 130 superboss isn't working for you, try instead:
- Smashing Vampire Bride Marion, a lvl 65 unique monster in Uraya's stomach, gives a fairly good drop rate for legendary cores.

Less popular alternatives:
- The [spoiler location] reached in Ch. 9 has a salvage spot you reach at the very end of the chapter. Smash and kill the lvl 50 krabbles for a good shot at legendary cores.
- Nearby that salvage spot, there is a unique ball enemy Haywire something. It can be smashed for legendary cores.

Q: Salvaging at Mor Ardain?
Simply salvage at Mor Ardain Empire -> Lower Level -> #2 Dock, which becomes accessible in Chapter 4.

Core farming: Use normal cylinders, fail the QTEs, and have _no_ tiers of salvaging mastery. Then, krabbles have a high chance of spawning and always drop at least a common core. Multiple treasure sensor tiers (get it from common blades or from rare blade Adenine) increase the odds that a krabble will _also_ drop a rare core - with 2 tiers of treasure sensor, rare cores seem to drop ~ 50% of the time. If you smash the krabble, it will drop a common core and often drop a rare core. So, it is possible to get 2 rare cores and 2 common cores per krabble - and sometimes 3 krabbles spawn.

With consistent smashing and enough treasure sensor on, you should be able to get at least 80 rare cores during one stack of 99 normal cylinders.

Money farming (also quickly raises Mor Ardain's dev level):
The salvage treasure from this spot can be traded in for good profit even if you only use normal cylinders. But, the real profits come from using gold cylinders and (optionally) one or two blades with Salvaging Mastery (comes on common blades, or on Boreas rare blade.) Perfect the QTEs, of course. You are looking for Magic Canvases and Ancient Chalices, 2 of each trades in for 30K and it's easy to make this multiple times over on 5 or so gold cylinders. Do this a few times and you'll be rich, it also raises Mor Ardain's dev level fairly fast.

Q: Gold cylinder buy / sell trick?
Gold cylinders cost 10/9/8/7/6/5K at dev level 0/1/2/3/4/5, and sell for 5K anywhere. Buying and selling the maximum number of gold cylinders you can hold (99) is a fast way to level up dev. Buying gives more dev than selling.
- This means you can buy 99 gold cylinders from Mor Ardain once at dev level 5 (easy to do by trading in salvage from dock #2, see "Salvaging at Mor Ardain") and sell them in another city to raise dev level without losing any money.
-- Rough table of number of gold cylinders needed to level up dev this way (this is based on having one of the deeds that increases dev point gains, and there are multiple such deeds):
0 -> 1: 2 x 99
1 -> 2: 2 x 99
2 -> 3: 3 x 99
3 -> 4: 5 x 99
4 -> 5: 5 x 99
So, worst case 17 trips to completely level up a city.
- A faster method, if you have some money to blow, is to just buy 99 gold cylinders and sell them back at a loss. Buying then reselling 1 x 99 gold cylinders takes you from dev level 4 to 5 instantly, at a loss of 99K gold.

Q: Tips for end-game combat?
Play around with these arts:
- Defensive arts such as Shield Hammer's shield art (note - only available on male drivers,) and whipswords/mech arms/chroma katana evasion arts (unisex.) Play as the tank, draw aggro, and use one of these arts just as the enemy is using a high-damage forecasted move.
Play around with these accessories:
- Avant-garde medal: Heals wearer for ~21% of all critical damage dealt. Dropped by the motorbikes in the [spoiler location] unlocked in Chapter 9. If your damage and crit-rate are high enough, the passive healing from this accessory basically makes you invincible.
- World tree drop: Increases damage by 12% for each blade switch (max 250%.) Dropped by smashing the lvl 130 superboss in temperantia, see "Smashing unique monsters for legendary cores?" This is a free 2.5x increase in your damage, it's nuts.