Musou Orochi 2 Ultimate Patch 1.05 - Analysis of Extra Reincarnations

 

So I had the chance to update Musou Orochi 2 Ultimate from version 1.02 all the way to the present version 1.05 released around Christmas time. I know, you're probably thinking: "Where the hell have you been, living under a rock?!" But trust me, there's a valid reason why I was staying on 1.02 for what seems to be an eternity. You see, my PS3's wireless has gotten funky and hence caused me to be offline since around October with no connection to the internet. I could theoretically connect using a wired Ethernet cable, but since my home's router is upstairs and my PS3 and HDTV are downstairs, I didn't want to run an hundred feet cable and have everyone tripping over it. Anyway, I finally got the chance to fix the wireless on the PS3. So now, I can finally connect with it to the internet once again, hurray! Still, I don't have a PSN account, so don't bother asking (I don't play online on the PS3 anyway).

You don't want to hear my sob story about my PS3 hardware woes though, so enough of that and let's get into the topic of this blog post—why nine reincarnations in patch 1.05 is overkill, and why KOEI even bothered to add in that many reincarnations.

So if you haven't learned yet, patch 1.05 adds a few new features, most notably extending the maximum numerical values of various elements, including reincarnations. In versions prior to 1.05, reincarnations are capped at three total. This cap allowed almost all characters to max speed (180) and an additional two to three other stats (health, defense and musou). That being said, it left you with the inability to max all five stats, so KOEI has kindly raised this cap to an absurd value—nine.

I decided to test it out and reincarnate a few character nine times. Not that you'll really want to though, because it's quite senseless to raise stats beyond their normal max values without reincarnations, strictly due to diminishing returns (you'll be working much more than what you'll be gaining in return, basically). The formula is two growth points per level after reincarnation, so 891 points is possible for every character.

What I discovered was that for a few characters that I did reincarnate nine times, I was able to max out all five of their stats by the eighth reincarnation. This meant their health was 999, attack was 999, defense was 999, musou was 999 and speed was 200. Yes, they did raise the speed cap to 200 instead of 180, which is still pretty lousy. Beyond the fourth reincarnation, speed remained capped at 200.

Keep in mind that in order for this to be possible, I had to be conservative with my growth points and use them only after I have leveled the character to 100 and not in-between.

I was then left with around 200 extra growth points on the ninth reincarnation for all characters, with nothing able to pump them into it. Hence, making the ninth and final reincarnation completely non-beneficial to your character stats.

Xu Shu ninth reincarnation with 176 extra growth points.

Nu Wa ninth reincarnation with 234 extra growth points.

Zhao Yun ninth reincarnation with 219 extra growth points.

Yukimura ninth reincarnation with 225 extra growth points.

Diao Chan max stats at eighth reincarnation with 21 extra growth points.

So in conclusion, reincarnating characters the max nine times is not necessary to max a character's stats. You may gain other rewards, but certainly not in the stats department!

I was also curious to what the max speed you can now have on a character, including all bonuses from items. With Charm of Alacrity (神速符) +20, Dual-Layered Armor (両当鎧) +20 and Tag Shell (札甲) +20, along with the new 200 speed cap, you'll end up with a grand total of 400 speed.

400 speed on Yukimura at max stats.

Testing out the 400 speed definitely felt insanely fast, and much, much faster than riding on both Red Hare and Matsukaze. Picking up speed shoes unfortunately didn't seem to have much of an effect, or there seems to be a cap on the max speed of the effect on the shoes. I didn't have time to test Rabbitskin Leggings (脱兎脚絆), as that will also double your speed when your life is in the red. I doubt you'll need them anyway, as you'll be blazing through battlefields like a rocket. It almost feels like cheating!

Anyway, I don't want to turn this post into a book, so I'll leave it at here. There are other things that 1.03-1.05 added, but they aren't significant enough to write about.

Also, I want to also mention I will be updating and reposting the Musou Orochi 2 Ultimate platinum status game save I posted earlier, which is now taken down. The reason why I took it down was because I desired to update it for subsequent patches past 1.02. I also liked characters growth and levels to be a bit more even, so I am in process (and nearly finished) of reincarnating all 145 character three times. Some characters will be reincarnated nine times due to the experiment above, but I am definitely not planning on reincarnating everyone nine times. Weapons will also be updated. I will be removing all 4 star +99 weapons, since they have become useless in patch 1.03+. The strongest weapons are now the 5 star crafted weapons from Unlimited Mode, because patch 1.03 allowed them to have +99 attack power from max compatibility (from the previous +18 max).

I will let you guys know when the new, updated game save will be available. I'll likely have it tomorrow or by Friday the latest, actually.

Until then, take care!