#ive collected all three kinds of boosters

[psychedelicflyingshark]

Unstoppable force (panera hypercaffinated lemonade) vs immovable object (covid booster shot)

[garak]

oh Please ramble abt ygo deck building techniques, im terrible at everything that isnt speed duels lmao

i learned yugioh with physical decks from a dude whos a tourney player so ive always been a 60 card deck kind of guy. i love collecting things so physically building a deck is really fun to me; there are a bunch of pictures of me at sdcc last year in the hotel room with three different blue eyes decks + several booster packs with all the cards laid out so i could consolidate them into one deck. speed dueling is fun and definitely a better basis for modern ygo shows and making a 60 card decks in dinks would suck, but i really love the intricacies of classic ygo deck building. like for a fusion deck you need a bunch of polymerization cards, and cards that let you get polymerization from the deck and the graveyard and the banished zone, and cards that let you get the monsters needed for those fusions, so for a blue eyes fusion deck you want to have a bunch of bingo machines and probably mweob but you also have to get rid of all of the dragon spirit of whites bc the dont count as a bewd, UNLESS youre trying to do a dual fusion/synchro deck because they do count as blue eyes monsters and often blue eyes synchro monsters ask not for specifically a bewd but instead just a blue eyes card in general. im more of an expert in blue eyes than in anything else so sorry for exclusively talking about it. im also a big fan of level monster archetypes, specifically silent magician. maybe im biased towards them bc im a big rivalshipping fan but i really enjoy dual blue eyes and silent magician decks but it could also be because the classic dual blue eyes dark magician has no appeal to me because i hate the dark magician archetype with my entire heart. magician navigation/magicians rod/dark magic inheritance/etc. are a scourge upon the earth and if i ever see the phrase “specifically lists dark magician or dark magician girl in its text” it will be too soon. no this has nothing to do with the fact that said guy who taught me yugioh and who could count my wins against him on one hand played a dark magician deck specifically made to be effective against a blue eyes synchro deck. ok ive gotten carried away again but anyhow here are some of my thoughts on various element of yugioh deck creation/archetypes

[glowyjellyfish]

A somewhat random collection of thoughts I had about Fenton the day after watching Super DuckTales:

-the way Fenton defeated the robot in the last episode of the movie makes a lot more sense today than it did twenty years ago, I think. Especially given how confident he acts about it--how would he know that he could count faster than a massive robot? Perhaps he was relying on his fast-talking skills? Or perhaps he was just basically pulling a captcha test on the robot, because that’s pretty much what it was.

-knowing Gyro, the Gizmoduck suit is probably thoughtfully equipped with some form of IV, waste recycling, maybe caffiene boosters of some kind, maybe some sort of shower-in-a-can. But still, Fenton was basically stuck in that suit for a solid week being controlled by various people and then on another planet. He must have been exhausted and starving and smelly by the time he got out of it. (and he’s got so much manic energy that I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s perfectly capable of just going and going and going until he runs out of Things he Needs To Do, at which point he abruptly crashes and sleeps for three days)

-I bet Launchpad at one point actually guessed Gizmoduck’s identity correctly based on the evidence he’d observed, laughed at himself for having such a stupid idea, and then went on his merry way assuming he was wrong. 

-I think Fenton just chugs around feeling perfectly normal most of the time but then suddenly has crippling panic/anxiety attacks at like 3 am over all the shit he’s just been through

-Fenton’s relationship with his mom is kinda shitty and complicated and all over the place. I mean, he lives with his mother and it’s partially because they’re broke and he’s taking care of her, I guess, and they care about each other deep down but his mother is very down on him like all the time and cannot be bothered to act like she gives a shit. Has he been competing with the TV for his mother’s attention his entire life? Add to that a missing father who is implied to be more of a deadbeat than just a Tragic Missing Disney Parent, and the result is… super dysfunctional and weird and possibly unique among Disney families? I assume it’s going to be at least somewhat different for 2017 Ducktales, because if Fenton is latino and his mom is latina then it probably wouldn’t be the best plan to portray her as lazy trailer park trash. But that’s just me.

-On the subject of 2017 Fenton, he is going to fit so well as an intern. I mean, firstly, 2017 Scrooge is a sensible man and has probably had the same dedicated, loyal, and trustworthy team of accountants for the last 40 years; he’s not going to hold the idiot ball for a moment and hire as his FIRST AND ONLY accountant someone who is uneducated, desperate, and cannot take no for an answer just because he has incredible counting skills. Secondly, if you’re going to have a character who flails around screwing up all the time and then pours all his boundless energy into fixing it, who accidentally puts on a supersuit and then starts lying about being the guy who was hired for it because he’s afraid of losing his job, works very hard all the time but is still dirt poor, and doesn’t get paid extra or overtime or hazard pay for being a literal superhero for his boss… sounds like an intern to me! He’ll fit right in with the lunatics at the Money Bin. I am curious whether he will be keeping his instant counting skills, because if he’s an intern working for Gyro it’s not going to be the reason he was hired, but it’s such a fun part of his character… maybe it just won’t come up much?

I feel like I had more. Maybe later.

[jewelwriter]

GSB:  Three Boosters for Pokemon Games

Disclaimer: "Gold, Silver, Bronze" is a personal countdown based on my own thoughts and measurements.  Please do not consider this as the list of all lists.  Also to let people know.  This is a smaller countdown as to not be as intrusive and get to the main ones that can be considered the best of the best in a certain manner.  If you have your own countdown of sorts, please post it up down below.  Thank you and enjoy the writing.

I'm going to be honest with you, the people... Pokemon has great potential to be really good.  Too bad that there's a lot of downsides in it all to really get there.  But if anything there's at least some hopes that I do want to see put in some time to make the Pokemon games a wonderful thing.  And, unlike a top 10 or 5, it's going to be in my format.

Welcome ladies and gentlemen. You've found a wild Jewelwriter.

And this is the Gold, Silver, Bronze for making Pokemon better again.

Bronze:  Removing any benefits from interacting with your Pokemon from effecting the battles that are in the game at all. (Plus)  Put EV mini games back into the games.

I'll swing this out first since there's something that I bet a lot of people aren't thinking of right now.  Pokemon wants you to use the Pokemon Amie (This time Version 3) to not only make having fun with your Pokemon a boon for suggestion grabbers and teddybear simulator fans but reward you for it by giving your Pokemon boosts that will aid them in the battles that it goes through.  THANKFULLY this doesn't go into the battle modes against other players or the next battle tower (hopefully) but make it where it's not helpful at ALL and only works for being in the Amie playscape.  It's probably not going to happen but if they did this then the battles might be smoother.  Though if you are wanting to use this feature of interacting with the Pokemon to mean something big, put EV gaining games into the Amie system.  If you are going to make your powerhouse a monster and have it REALLY affect the game, do this.  Trust me, it might get tiring but it can save you effort to battle and all you need to do is LEVEL up which can be done a number of ways... especially if the words of multi leveling candy are true.

Silver:  GET rid of the Pokemon Box in your Bag.

Gather around trainers since this was one of the better ages of battle, where you had to rewind your efforts and risk having a really safe spot not be around for miles in order to PATCH up your team's HP and Switch your Party via talking to the PC.  You novice trainers got it too easy and it really sucks that you get aroused at the idea of EASE of access when there is supposed to be a REAL challenge.  It's bad enough the EXP share is on by default and the like but come on, give us a reason to visit Pokemon Centers that aren't going to be gimmick collecting!  We already got convenience baked in since gen 5 did it for us, putting in the options of going to a Pokemon Center to Shop for items instead of going to an individual shop to buy a product.  This is the kind of convenience that should be in the games.  Not make it where the PCs are just dust collectors.  I mean we still got terminals that can be used for this reason.

(Honored Mention) I'm giving this to the obvious one of all that probably should be gold but I'm keeping away from the obvious because of how much hate has been shot at by others and you [BLEEP]ing know who you are and I'll give you and two certain youtube personas the middle fingers of rage.  One with an M to start and one with a V to start.  And if you don't like it, then take a D up your A.  And that's easy: Put the Pokemon, the namesake of the series, back into Pokemon games, period.  From zero-zero-one (001) to Eight-hundred nine (809).  Sure you can limit the forms but no bleeping deleting Pokemon from the records.

Gold:  Give Pokemon more than just one style of Battle to do mostly in the games.

Bet you didn't see this one coming huh?  A bit of a backstory for those that are too set in stone: There have been mini-games that worked to reward you for playing the game in a different way.  These reward you with a number of things.  Pokemon, TMs, and Items in the original and each gen on up to gen 4.  Sure not to add casino-style games but something that is fun and could be fun for you and the Pokemon.  Have it where you can win or lose is a benefit.  If the Pokemon Wins, it can earn things from a few berries to comic shards and star pieces.  If you win, you can get a stat boost or stat shrink to an IV stat of a Pokemon and thanks to the nature that a Pokemon has, they could be more to a certain nature to help make it more predictable to a degree, at least if it favors a certain stat to boost.  It'd be a good win-win for all.  Though for this, save it for the post-game.  It's starving for content.

So I'll let you guys talk it over to say what you like.  Let me know what you think somewhere on the net.

And remember... the quality of the product is up to the individual!  My gold might be your toilet paper.

Jewelwriter signing off.

[nexttimepso2-blog]

Ability Affixing Part 3: Reference Guide

Each Special Ability has different rates for transferring to a different item, and many abilities have increased rates for multiples of the ability present across each item, and some of those cannot even be transferred at all if there is not at least 2 of the ability present! In this article, I’ll break down each group of Special Abilities and what it takes to transfer them across items. If you want to follow along, I am going to be posting screen captures from the spreadsheet I’ve made here: Special Ability Reference document

EDIT: wow you cannot see those images at all; I thought there was some kind of zoom function if you clicked on them haha. yeah just open that spreadsheet right now you are going to need that.

Basic Stat Boosters

This family of abilities are the bare-bones “boosts a single stat” abilities, while they are not too fancy, they do typically give a large amount of the stat they do give.

Power / Shoot / Tech / Arm / Body / React / Mind

I = +10, II = +20, III = +30, IV = +35, V = +40

Stamina I = +20 HP, II = +40, III = +50, IV = +60, V = +70

Spirita I = +2 PP, II = +3, III = +4, IV = +5, V = +6

[Damage Type] Resist I = +3 [Damage Type] Resistance, II = +4, III = +5, IV = +6, V = +7

��Boss soul” varies as different boss souls will supply the 20% boost to different abilities. For specifics, please consult the “Boss Boost” sheet on the Special Ability Reference document. The “Extreceptor” ability’s boost for inheriting Stat IV and Vs appears to be ignored if there are three or more of of the ability present already. Photon (Stamina/Spirita), Attack (Power/Shoot/Tech), and Gaurd(Body/React/Mind) Receptors, Available from support items in the SG Scratch, will transfer their designated Stat V abilities with a 100% rate with only one Stat V ability available.

To upgrade a Stat Boost ability up one grade, you need 2 or 3 of the ability present. any more than that will not have any additional effect.

Mutation I and II are very useful for synthesizing Stat III and Stat IV abilities, Photon Collect only works for Resistances, and is only available on items in the Photon Drop Shop, and cannot be transferred itself, so it’s usefulness is limited at best.

Ability and All Resist

Ability and All Resist are interesting, in that they are often found on items dropped by bosses, and can be transferred; but they are much easier to Synthesize yourself

Ability I = +5 All ATK, DEF, and DEX, II = +10 All, III = +15 All

All Resist I = +1 All Resistances, II = +2, III = +3

As shown here, Ability and All Resist can be hard to move between items once they exist; but if you combine the right abilities you can Synthesize them at a much more agreeable rate. Doom Break and Gryphon Soul can make moving pre-made Ability III and All Resist III reasonable as well.

Boss Souls

Boss Souls are special abilities dropped by bosses or other specific enemies like Rappies and Singo Betes. These abilities typically boost one or more Attack or Defense stats, or Dex, while also supplying a decent amount of HP, PP, or a little bit of both. There are still exceptions to even that much, so be sure to examine each soul you find to see what stats they give! You can only have one boss soul ability on any given item however.

The ability “Soul Receptor” allows you to transfer a boss soul with 100% success, allowing you to safely upslot a boss soul to an item with more ability slots on it. Soul Receptor is only available on items obtained from PSO2es, the mobile companion game for iOS and Android.

Toh’oh and Full Vegas Soul added in Episode 4 have 10% higher transfer rates, but they also have another use: to synthesize a set of special soul abilities

By having an Earth soul and a soul ability of a Free Field Quest boss (forest uses Fang Soul, and Desert is unrepresented), you can create your choice of Act the Soul, Till the Soul, and Magi the soul. These souls have +35 to an ATK stat with +3 PP, making them easy to make and use. However, once made these souls can only be transferred at half the rates normal souls use, but it’s not too difficult to synthesize a new one if you need too.

Mutation

Mutation I appears on gear dropped by bosses that have a title on their name, such as “Tyrant Rockbear”.  Meanwhile Mutation II can either be dropped by the special-titled bosses within Seasonal Emergency Quests, like “Tempest King: Fang Banther”. Mutation II can also be synthesized when 3 to 5 Mutation Is are present.

As noted earlier, Mutation I and II both help substantially with synthesizing a Stat III ability from combining Stat IIs however they do also give a respectable amount of All-ATK too!

Mutation I = +10 All-ATK and HP, II = +15 All-ATK and HP 

Vinculum and Modulator

Vinculum = +20 All-ATK

Modulator = +30 All-ATK

Vinculum and Modulator are pretty simple yet powerful abilities, they give a large chunk of All-ATK, but you cannot have both of them on the same item. Therefore people tend to favor Modulator over Vinculum, despite Modulator exclusively dropping on items found from ARKS Clones.

Vinculum seems to drop mostly from boss-based Emergency Quests, and bosses encountered in Emergency Quests that have a two-part name; the original example of this is “Mad Machine: Big Vardha”. Though this type of way to point out what drops Vinc seems kinda sketchy since I think many of the translated enemy titles have 2 words to the name anyway. Vinculum is also hard to move around to new items without Anga Soul present.

Modulator is easier to move to a destination item, but ARKS Clones are extremely rare these days. Clones only appear in Single Party Areas of quests that do not have a set enemy spawn layout, or at the end of the Time Attack Abduction quest, where you must face-off against your own clone.

Stigma and Extreme Quest Abilities

Stigma = +20 DEX +5PP

Flict Arma = +20 S-ATK +3 PP

Flict Tiro = +20 R-ATK +3 PP

Flict Magia = +20 T-ATK +3 PP

Alter Arma/Tiro/Magia = +20 ATK, +30 HP

Stigma appears on items dropped by rare enemies, either rare versions of enemies as well as Rappies, Tagami and Izane Kazutchi. DEX is kind of a useless stat so the real thing here is the +5 PP. Incompatible with the Extreme Quest abilities for some reason.

Flict/Alter Arma/Tiro/Magia appear on items dropped in Extreme Quests, so they are hard to come across unless you are running those often. They require three of the same ability in order to transfer at all, so they are hard to move even when you do find a bunch of them. They can also be moved with Extreceptor and 1 of the desired abilities; while this makes it a whole lot easier, Extreceptor is only available from reward items in Extra Hard PSO2es Emergency Missions, so the supply of Extreceptor is very limited.

Raid Boss Factors

Yamato Factor = +20 R-ATK, +10 S/T-ATK, +20HP, +1PP

Mother Factor = +20 T-ATK, +10 S/R-ATK, +20HP, +1PP

Deus Factor = +20 S-ATK, +10 R/T-ATK, +20HP, +1PP

The Episode 4 Emergency Quest Bosses drop items with Factor abilities with their names, instead of Soul abilities. Statistically, they are similar to Flict/Alter abilities but with +10 of the other ATK stats. Each of the Episode 4 Souls, Toh’oh Soul, Full Vegas Soul, and Escared Soul, boost one of the factor’s transfer rates by 20%. While Yamato and Deus factors will drop with the soul that helps transfer them, Mother Factor needs you to bring in a Full Vegas Soul from another item to boost it.

Status Effects

Status Effect abilities are only available for weapons. They can be a bit hard to move around, but in general people don’t go out of their way for them anyway. They can be nice for Fighter mains or subs, since you could use them to help activate Chase Advance on an enemy, or if a boss reacts to a particular status effect.

Doom Break and Miscellaneous Abilities

Doom Break = +15 All-ATK, +2PP

Seasonal Rappy and Nayu Fevers = various stats, never more than some combination of +10 ATK, +5 DEX, +5-10HP, +1-2PP

Spirita Alpha = +30 DEX, +3PP

Doom Break used to only appear on items dropped by Odin from the FFXIV collab event; you can still run into Odin randomly in ARKS Quests and Free Field Quests, or as a Parallel Area for his arena, but now they have added it to most of the items that Laplace’s Demon drops, and made the big guy show up in Wind and Rain, and hopefully every seasonal EQ from here on out he’s not going to be in Beach Wars 2017 so now I got no idea if that was a fluke or what. It also gives a +20% boost to Ability III’s transfer rates

Seasonal Rappy and Nayu fever abilities are basically “Junk” abilities that do a little more than the typical Junk abilities. Saint Fever, Love Fever, and Latan Fever are notable for being +10 ATK +2 PP, while Frog Fever, Lovey Fever, and Egg Fever give +10 ATK +10 HP. all six of these come one after another from Haloween through Rainy season Rappies.

Spirita Alpha shows up on item rewards from Code: Variant emergency trials when a person uses a Rare Enemy trigger item from the casino. that or you get Pink ARKS badges as a reward to trade-in for units with Spirita Alpha on them. Nobody really uses this because it’s not much PP and DEX doesn’t really do anything important.

Ultimate Buster only appears on weapons dropped on Extra Hard difficulty, requires 5 items with the ability to even transfer, and cannot be added to 13-star weapons at all. it boosts damage against Ultimate-area enemies by 10%; so it was meant more to help people fight through the Ultimate areas back when they were still new, and 13-star weapons were much harder to obtain. These days it just means weapons can have 1 more ability that can show up on them to boost the overall number of slots that appear on them.

Affixing Hell: Catalysts and Returner

Soul Catalyst, Factor Catalyst, and Ether Soul are very hard to make. I just sell any unit I get with a Falz soul on it these days. they make good cash since people still want to make Soul Catalysts for Astral Soul.

Factor Catalyst and Ether Soul on the other hand are a bit easier, since the Episode 4 Raid Bosses tend to drop their Factor abilities on most of the items they drop (Yamato’s going to get buffed to do that better soon), though since they are all schedule-only emergency quests, the supply lives and dies based on Sega’s Scheduling.

Astral Soul = +35 ALL, +35 HP, +5 PP

Ether Factor = +30 ALL, +10 HP, +6 PP

And here we see why people bother chasing after Soul and Factor Catalysts.

Astral Soul is far and away the strongest soul ability in the game, while the Earth Compound Souls do give +35 to one ATK, Astral just gives everything +35. so really it’s more of an end-goal for users seeking a generalist unit setup.

Ether Factor is the same way, though it trades away most of the HP for more PP. Ether Factor seems a little easier to make since Factor Catalyst only needs 3 ingredients to Soul Catalyst’s 5.

Since Astral and Ether require 4 catalysts, and you cannot have more than one catalyst on a single item, it is impossible to synthesize them both at the same time. Ignore that bit about Astral Soul having a 10% Inheritance Rate with Soul Receptor. Just... don’t look at it...

Returner

I = +3 ALL, +3 HP, +1PP

II = +5 ALL, +5 HP, +2 PP

III = +10 ALL, +10 HP, +3 PP

IV = +15 ALL, +15 HP, +4 PP

V = +30 ALL, +30 HP, +5 PP

Upon clearing the Time Trial Abduction Quest, you are rewarded with a 1 to 2 slot unit with Returner I (Super Hard) or Returner III (Extra Hard)

Returner is Upslot Hell.

There are people with one or more unit that has Astral Soul and Returner V on them, but these people have billions of meseta at their disposal.

Add Special Ability items

AC and SG Scratch have a set of items in their prize pool that attach a special ability to an item at the end of the affixing process. These abilities are great in general, but the ones from the AC Scratch generally cost a lot of money to buy from other players, and the ones from the SG scratch are a little hard to come across. They cannot be inherited, so you want to use them for when you want to lock-in your abilities on your units for a good while.

Special Ability Factors (SAFs)

New-Type weapons, when ground to +35, are able to transfer an ability with 100% transfer rate when they are used in Special Ability Affixing. Even the base weapon can provide an SAF, so more often than not you will want to try to stick some cheap abilities on your weapon after you have ground it up to +35 just so you can also obtain it’s SAF. This does -not- consume the ability if someday you decide to use the weapon to affix another weapon, so there is hardly any reason to not affix a base weapon’s SAF if it is available.

Since new weapons are being added every so often, Please consult the Special Ability Factor page of my spreadsheet for more info. (as of this writing I have not added an SAF page)

Swiki also has a good page listing Special Ability Factors, so check that out too.

Sentence and Phrase abilities are only available as SAFs, as well as some normally unobtainable grades of other abilities, like Ability IV (14-star weapons) and Power VI (Seikaiser weapons from upgraded Yamato)

Closing Statements

As PSO2 continues, I will try to update this post with new abilities as they are added, or at least keep the spreadsheet, updated.

There is still one more article left in me for ramble on about Special Abilities, and that is an article on how to get yourself setup with some decent unit abilities without spending a lot of meseta chasing after stuff like Flict/Alter or Modulator.