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Problems with Shin Megami Tensei IV


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Although I should be experienced in the SMT series by playing Persona and Devil Survivor, this game is a mess for me so far.

It took me 20 attempts to beat the second tutorial mission.

The enemies one- or tworound one party member. If they get my weakness they can even kill multiple times.

The random as idiotic demon recruitments make this game even harder for me. Each failed demon recruitment means an auto death of one of my demons or the protagonist because my team loses the turn. Also losing items is the last thing I need.

This game is just savestating so far and kills the fun.

I'm really considering to quit this game once for all.

But before I do it, maybe someone could give me tips to survive this game without saving and resetting all the time?

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I'm presuming you're playing on the lowest difficulty? If not, bump it down. SMT games as a whole teeter towards the difficult end of the spectrum. Earlygame is legitimately difficult, but after the second main boss, SMT4 suddenly becomes a lot more manageable. Demon Negotiation is random, but it's not too terrible. Outside of Macca and rare items, you should give the demon whatever they ask for. I'm referring to items like Life Stones. If you do decide on staying with the game, then it's something you're just going to have to stomach, since fusing is as mandatory as ever.

A general tip that's good for first players is to have the main character specialise purely in Magic and Agility, and allow him to have full coverage over the four elements. The MC will hit like a bulldozer.

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Magic does trivialize the game in its own right, having done it on my blind playthrough; post-Medusa bosses rarely got a second turn in. Dex seems to be the most effortless way to cheese the game, though.

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I'm presuming you're playing on the lowest difficulty? If not, bump it down. SMT games as a whole teeter towards the difficult end of the spectrum. Earlygame is legitimately difficult, but after the second main boss, SMT4 suddenly becomes a lot more manageable. Demon Negotiation is random, but it's not too terrible. Outside of Macca and rare items, you should give the demon whatever they ask for. I'm referring to items like Life Stones. If you do decide on staying with the game, then it's something you're just going to have to stomach, since fusing is as mandatory as ever.

A general tip that's good for first players is to have the main character specialise purely in Magic and Agility, and allow him to have full coverage over the four elements. The MC will hit like a bulldozer.

Umm... Idk what difficulty I'm playing actually because I couldn't / still can't set. I guess lowest?

Someone told me that the difficulty will be lowered if I die often. Idk if it's true.

Welp... actually magic is the stat with the least priority for my protagonist so far.

But now I know at least.

Justa question: What is dex exactly? Is this the same as strike from the Persona series?

Have completed the tutorial.

The protagonist is level 5 currently. Bought better sword and armor with all the macca I got.

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strength - basic sword damage, minor effect on physical skills

dexterity - basic gun damage, large effect on physical skills
magic - magic damage
agility - preemptive attack rate, turn order, hit and evasion rate

luck - affects critical rate, item drop rate, ailment susceptability; possibly various other things

And yes, dying repeatedly will result in the game giving you the option to lower the difficulty setting.

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Is magic really the best option for first playthroughs? I would have thought physical orientation would be a better option.

It's weird, but you'll get more damage on your physical skills by putting points into Dex than Strength, Strength is kind of a dump stat in IV.

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Someone told me that the difficulty will be lowered if I die often. Idk if it's true.

After the second time you get a total party wipe and you go to Charon, Easy will unlock.

Edited by AzureSen
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The game gets much easier and a lot more fun once you unlock (spoiler) and beat a certain boss to get there.

Early game is tough, definitely, but it'll get a lot better. Trust me. Just keep playing, make liberal use of the fusion function and exploit weaknesses. It's good to look them up so you don't accidentally die by trying at random; there's absolutely no shame in doing so. I think I did that at earlygame as well.

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btw, if you're going with a physical build, DON'T invest in STR. DEX is waaaaaay better. Seriously. STR is almost useless in this game.

Another thing, don't give the demons every thing they ask for when you're trying to recruit them. Give them stupid shit like life stones (you get a billion of those), but if they ask for something you don't want to give them, don't do it.

There are actually some demons that like it when you deny some things they ask.

Edited by Nobody
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Although I should be experienced in the SMT series by playing Persona and Devil Survivor, this game is a mess for me so far.

It took me 20 attempts to beat the second tutorial mission.

The enemies one- or tworound one party member. If they get my weakness they can even kill multiple times.

The random as idiotic demon recruitments make this game even harder for me. Each failed demon recruitment means an auto death of one of my demons or the protagonist because my team loses the turn. Also losing items is the last thing I need.

This game is just savestating so far and kills the fun.

I'm really considering to quit this game once for all.

But before I do it, maybe someone could give me tips to survive this game without saving and resetting all the time?

Early game tends to be unforgiving so you and your demons getting killed so easily is normal.

Recruiting demons can be a pain but every race or demon type has their own particular flags in their dialogue that tend to work most often when you try to recruit them. Like, for example, some Beast demons will ask about eating something and you can choose your self as the option in which they will take a good chunk of health from you and decide whether you are worth joining or not. And even that will be RNG.

Once you get past the second boss you'll some more freedom in how to use demons and stuff. The beginning of the game in SMT4 just drags on for too long before letting you actually enjoy the game.

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Thanks for your tips guys!

Assuming to your comments I'm not the only one who had trouble with the difficulty in this game, at least early game.

I replayed the tutorial chapters once more to follow your suggestions.

  • Grinded the protagonist to level 6 and gave him mainly magic, dex and agility.
  • Have currently six demons which have skills in each element except for fire.
  • Spent all my macca in a better sword and armor.
  • Mainly used HP, MP and life drops to recruit a new demon.

However it still pisses me off whenever a demon escapes after wasting lots of stuff in it.

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  • Grinded the protagonist to level 6 and gave him mainly magic, dex and agility.

Honestly, I'd focus on either DEX or MAG, not both.

For physical builds, I like going with 3DEX, 1LUK, 1AGI every level up

For magic builds, I go with 3MAG, 1LUK, 1AGI

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I see, thanks!

I mainly gave +1 or 2 magic or dex (alternate), 2 agility and 1 luck.

But I guess I'll do it from now on like you said.

Another question:

Is it harder to recruit a demon which is higher level than the protagonist / party members?

I kinda have the impression.

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If a demon is higher level than your protagonist I don't think they'll even join you. They may give you items but they will brush you off. However if you have a demon on your team and the same one is with the enemy, you can convince them to lavish you with stuff. Also, binding an enemy (status effect) makes them SIGNIFICANTLY easier to coerce money from a demon! Once you get through the first two bosses the difficulty will drop off a lot. You might still die from some freak accidents but easy mode becomes unnecessary after awhile. Instead you'll be reaching for estoma sword (this game's version of a repel).

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If a demon is higher level than your protagonist I don't think they'll even join you. They may give you items but they will brush you off. However if you have a demon on your team and the same one is with the enemy, you can convince them to lavish you with stuff. Also, binding an enemy (status effect) makes them SIGNIFICANTLY easier to coerce money from a demon! Once you get through the first two bosses the difficulty will drop off a lot. You might still die from some freak accidents but easy mode becomes unnecessary after awhile. Instead you'll be reaching for estoma sword (this game's version of a repel).

Oh I see, thanks!

This explains why they will disappear from the battlefield.

In the tutorial was a level 6 wilder (Idr its name) which never joined me despite many attempts to recruit it.

Anyways I'll stick with normal mode (or whatever mode it actually is) because I want to accept this challenge.

Edit: Have completed the siqequest with the boss Orcus in my very first attempt.

(A bit grinding and fusing was necessary though.)

Edited by Ayama Wirdo
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After you get past a certain point, the difficulty of SMTIV sort of falls off.

Although you can still get ganked by random encounters every now and again.

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Once you get past the second boss you'll some more freedom in how to use demons and stuff. The beginning of the game in SMT4 just drags on for too long before letting you actually enjoy the game.

Is Wendigo meant with the second boss or the two demons before (idr name) him?

If so, then it seems to be that I have beaten the worst part.

The demon boss who captured Navarre was very easy for me compared to the previous ones.

I find fusing is really nerfed since the stats of the demons won't be transferred (unlike in Devil Survivor).

Theres no point for me to fuse a demon to get a lower leveled one.

Also the fusing possibilities are way lower than in DeSu so I'll stick with my current demons for a while.

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Fusing gets more powerful as you improve your apps. Eventually you can fuse something higher level than your current level with fusion booster and fusion exp boost. In the early game you tend to fuse for resistances more than anything else. Sometimes you fuse something just to fuse the result later on for an even better choice of demon. The possibilities near endgame are insane. I had some crazy demons on my side.

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